Adjustments
by clp66
Summary: A year has passed by in the life of House and Susan.  Susan is married to David and she is adjusting to life as a mother of a pre-teenage boy. House is home and is on parole; how will he help Susan and Phillip start their lives together?
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: This story is a little shorter than normal. A year has gone by in the life of House between season seven and eight, so it seems appropriate that a year go by in the life of Susan as well, so the story picks up where House returns to PPTH and is timed to start the day after "Transplant", so in the story actual story, House is back, he's on parole, his hair is longer and he has Dr. Park on his team and Adams as well, although in the actual story line Adams didn't show up until Charity Case._

_A lot has happened to Susan in the last year, the major event in her life being her marriage to David. Laura doesn't figure prominently in this story although she is mentioned on several occasions, with the focus being between Susan and Phillip and how House helps them grow in their relationship._

_I hope you enjoy, and as always – I'd love you hear what you think._

_Clp66_

Story Seven:

CHAPTER ONE:

David was propped up against his headboard with his eyes closed listening to his wife hum softly as she prepared to take her shower. They'd both taken the day off together yesterday and this morning she'd woken him up in a most pleasant manner before his alarm had even gone off. He was basking in the afterglow and thinking that this was a much more reasonable way to wake up in the mornings than the abruptness the alarm clock provided. He turned his head toward the door and smiled as she progressed from humming to actually singing. She really had a nice voice and could probably have gone places with it if her life had taken a different path. They'd been married for nearly three months and while it had seemed forever to him before she was ready to take the plunge, their engagement hadn't really even been a year. Shortly after he'd proposed, her brother had gone off the deep end. He'd stolen some of the compound from Dr. Riggin's study and as Susan had feared, the inflammation markers she was seeing in the rat serum samples were due to tumor growth. When Susan realized what he had done, she went to his apartment to make sure he was OK, not knowing that he had already developed tumors in his injured thigh and like an idiot tried to remove them himself. Dominique was babbling in her native tongue and led Susan to the bathroom. Her tone and gestures made it quite clear to Susan that Dominique felt this was not in their contract and that she had no intention of cleaning it up. When Susan saw all the blood and the surgical tools, she knew immediately what had happened and after a few phone calls determined he was in the hospital and recovering. Dr. Cuddy had come to his rescue during the night. Susan cleaned up the mess and when David finally found her, she had just finished cleaning his bathroom and was sitting on the floor with silent tears coursing down her cheeks. Of course she had blamed herself because she had been the one to introduce Greg to the compound, not realizing that in his current state of mind that he would take that information to do something so drastic. It had taken a lot of talking on his part to make her finally accept that House's self-destructive nature had taken control after the breakup and if anything she had helped stabilize him preventing him from doing something even worse, although he wasn't sure what 'worse' would have been at that point. David shook his head to clear himself of the memories just as he heard the shower start to run. He smiled to himself and counted to 30 to give the shower time to get nice and warm and for Susan to adapt to the temperature. He got out of bed and quietly opened the bathroom door. He stepped up next to the shower curtain and opened it halfway.

Susan was fully under the water with her eyes closed allowing the hot water to course down her body. Her eyes snapped open with the sudden rush of cold air, "David! Close the curtain, it's cold," she exclaimed.

"I can see that," David said enjoying the particular display Susan's body was providing. Susan crossed her arms hiding his source of enjoyment.

"Either get in or get out, but shut the curtain," Susan said.

"I thought you'd never ask," he said stepping inside.

A half hour later, David and Susan were back in their room and getting dressed for work. "You know, you don't have to be in the lab before 9:00am he said coming up behind her and wrapping his arms around her. Better yet, we could take today off too."

"You're insatiable," Susan laughed as she tilted her head back to accept his kiss. "No, I need to go in to work. It always seems that life falls apart in the lab when I'm gone, even for just one day. Besides, Dr. Foreman sent me a text last night that he needed to meet with me early this morning."

"What do you suppose that is about?" David asked releasing her so she could finish dressing.

"Probably wants to tell me I have to cut back in the lab again. I don't know how he expects us to get all the work done if he keeps cutting the laboratory budget. I suppose I should just be thankful I still have a job after everything that happened. The board wasn't exactly pleased with anything related to diagnostics. Dr. Foreman being named Dean is the only thing that allowed me to stay there."

"You weren't a charity case Susan; Dr. Foreman respects your abilities. You weren't the only candidate for that position and you got it because you were the best, not because of anything related to House or his former team."

"Still though," Susan said.

"Still nothing," David replied as he started tying his tie. "You deserve that job and you do it well."

Susan came over to him and straightened his tie, "You're good for my ego," she said wrapping her arms around him.

David returned the hug, "I'm good for a lot of things," he replied followed by a quick kiss and a smile at the beauty that was his wife.

"Nothing wrong with your ego," Susan said as she gathered her things. "I've got to go. Are you taking Phillip to school or is he riding the bus today?"

"I'm dropping him off," he replied.

Susan walked out the bedroom door and found Phillip in the kitchen eating a bowl of cereal. "Your dad will be out in a minute. Are you ready to go?" Phillip pointed at his backpack on the chair next to him without responding. "Is everything OK?" Susan asked.

"Its fine," Phillip said and continued eating without further comment.

Susan looked toward him a little longer and decided not to follow-up for the moment. While they got along well, Phillip hadn't yet adjusted to her continual presence, and she didn't want to push things with him. He'd come around on his own in time. She looked at her watch, "Well, I've got to go. See you tonight." Phillip was unresponsive as Susan took her leave.


	2. Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

As Susan drove she thought about the laboratory budget. Susan had trimmed the budget significantly when she was given the position. If there was anything Susan was good at, it was pinching pennies. When the former director had left, several of the lab techs under him had left as well. Actually, Susan was glad to be rid of those particular individuals as she had never been all that impressed. With a few adjustments in the way incoming specimens were handled, Susan had been able to modify the work schedules with the employees she retained and had not needed to hire additional personnel to replace those that had left. Her next task had been to start negotiating with their supply vendors for the supplies they needed to run the tests. So far, she'd been able to drop the supply costs down 10% and she wasn't finished with her negotiations. She anticipated another 2% decrease in supply costs with the meetings she had scheduled with vendors this week. There was a department head meeting scheduled for next week and she was hoping to be able to point to the additional cost savings during her departmental status presentation.

She pulled into the parking lot and took her assigned place, and out of habit looking toward Greg's old spot in the handicapped section. There was a car parked there, but of course, she didn't recognize it. There was a different car parked there every day. She sighed to herself. Susan was still upset with him for disappearing like he did, but she hoped he was OK. She knew he was in prison for having rammed his car into Dr. Cuddy's house and fleeing the country afterwards. She'd tried to write him quite a few times over the last year, but her letters were always returned unopened. She tried to call, but the calls were unanswered. She even tried to visit once, but she was told he was in isolation and not allowed visitors. Finally she gave up trying to contact him and moved on with her life, but it still bothered her. He was her brother after-all. _Quit daydreaming Susan_, she told herself. _It's time to see what Dr. Foreman wants_.

MDMDMDMD

"Susan," Foreman said as he looked up when she opened the door. "Please have a seat." Susan sat in one of the chairs in front of Foreman's desk. "How have you been?" he asked.

"I'm fine, but we both know you're not really interested," she said with a smirk. "So, how about we drop the formalities and you tell me what couldn't wait for the actual work day to begin?"

Foreman returned her half smile and shook his head, "There are certain aspects of your personality that remind me of someone else. Someone I've recently interacted with."

"You've seen Dr. House?" Susan asked.

"Yes," Foreman said. Susan didn't reply. "Don't you want to know how he's doing?"

"Did you want to know how your brother was doing when he was in prison?" Susan asked. "I seem to recall quite a bit of animosity back then."

"Yes, but you're not me," Foreman said.

"True. I actually _have_ tried to contact my brother on numerous occasions to no avail," Susan said. "I've decided that when he wants to talk to me, he'll make contact on his own. Until then, I'll respect his privacy. Is there anything else?"

Foreman started to say something but shook his head. Susan got up, left his office and went to her own.

Susan unlocked the door to her office, walked inside and turned on her computer. While she waited for her computer to boot up, she pulled out the top document from her in-box. "Susan?"

She looked up, "Yes Abby, how are you today?"

"I'm fine. I saw you in Dr. Foreman's office this morning. I was wondering what that was about," she said.

"Oh, it was nothing important. Why?" Susan asked.

"Well, with all the budget cuts we've had recently, there's a rumor going around that now that Dr. House is back, that we'll all have to take a pay cut to pay his salary. There isn't any way that the hospital could afford him."

While that particular piece of news was new to Susan, she kept her face straight, "Dr. Foreman certainly didn't mention anything about that this morning. I wouldn't worry about it; you know how rumors fly around here. I'm sure Dr. Foreman will cover his salary without dipping into everybody else's." Susan's phone beeped. She reached into her pocket and glanced at it, "What's our specimen load looking like this morning?"

"About normal," Abby said.

"OK. Well, I have to take care of a few things, but I'll be in later this afternoon to help process them," she said. Abby left and Susan called David, "What's up?" she asked when he answered.

"I got wind that House is back," he said.

"Yeah, I just heard that particular rumor myself," she answered. "I haven't had a chance to check it out yet."

"Are you going up to see him?" David asked.

"Haven't decided yet," she said glancing at her watch, "It's too early for him to be in yet anyway."

"Okay. Love you."

"Love you too, see you tonight," Susan answered and hung up.

Susan sat back in her chair and picked up the slinky that one of her employees had given her a few weeks back and started piddling with it. So Greg had been back for at least a full day and she hadn't heard anything. No phone calls, no note, no text, no nothing. Just the same as it had been for the last year or so since he disappeared. Susan couldn't help but wonder why he had completely avoided any contact with her. What could she possibly have done? _No_, she told herself, _I haven't done anything. I'm not going down that path. _Susan put the slinky back on her desk and started going through her email. She had a report to write, a meeting with a supply vendor to prepare for and she needed to help the crew with the specimens. Well, she didn't really need to help them – they could handle it themselves, but she liked working alongside them from time to time to show them she was willing to get into the thick of it with them. It helped them feel comfortable to come to her when needed.

MDMDMDMDMD

House hung up the phone and looked up as the door to his office opened, "Who was that?" Foreman asked.

"What? You have to monitor my phone calls now too?" House asked.

"I need to make sure that when you are on hospital grounds, you are doing hospital work," Foreman said.

"Cut me some slack, I was trying to reach Taub," House said.

"You know we can't afford him," Foreman said

"Look, obviously you aren't as good at soliciting donations as your predecessor, which isn't your fault since you don't look good in a push up bra, but if I can get some money in here to cover my department, I want to bring in a team. Chase, Taub, Thirteen and Susan are known quantities." House replied.

"You can't have Susan," Foreman said.

"I figured you'd say as much," House said. "Making her the lab director was probably the only smart move you made since you became boss."

Foreman rolled his eyes, "She _has_ been an asset, which is why you can't have her. I need her where she is."

"Don't worry, I'm not going to tread on your territory," House said picking up the receiver to call Thirteen again.

"It's all my territory House," Foreman said and walked out the door.

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan finished going through all her email from the last two days and started working through the laboratory database for specimens that had come through on her day off so she could determine if there was anything left that needed to be completed. As she was going through the database, she came across some rather interesting testing that had been done, apparently on a set of lungs. Her curiosity peaked, she opened the history file and learned that the lungs belonged to a young man who had died in a motorcycle crash and had been earmarked for transplant to one of Dr. Wilson's patients. She could see that Dr. Simpson had ordered quite a number of tests spanning the course of 4 hours, all of which didn't solve the puzzle for them, and then nothing for a couple of hours, followed by another test. Susan realized the track they were on, but she could see where it was going. She continued to scroll through the testing following along mentally their train of thought. Suddenly the train jumped to a completely different track and along with it the name of the ordering physician; Dr. Gregory House. So, they ran out of ideas and ran to Greg. Susan smiled to herself. She wondered what strings Dr. Foreman had to pull to get him out of jail. She closed the history file and went back to the specimen database when the inter-office messaging system window popped up.

"_Lunch?"_ It was Greg.

"Finally getting around to me, huh?"

"_Been busy"_

"I can see that. Not real happy with you"

"_Sorry"_

"No you're not"

"_You're right. So do you want lunch?"_

"I'll be in the cafeteria in 30 minutes"

MDMDMDMDMD

House found Susan at an isolated table in the corner of the cafeteria. He walked up and sat across the table. She didn't say anything, but pushed a plate with a Reuben and a serving of fries on it toward him. "So, how have you been?" he asked.

"Do you really want to know?

"Not really," He paused and noted the ring on her finger, "You're married."

"Very astute," Susan said.

"You're mad."

"Not sure that 'mad' really covers it," Susan said. "It's a mix between being upset, disappointed, hurt…"

"Hurt?" House asked.

"Yeah, hurt." Susan replied.

"Why would you be hurt? I didn't crash through your window."

"Hmm, let's see. Where should I start? Was it because you stole the _untested_ experimental compound from the project _I_ was working on for Dr. Riggin to self-medicate and then when that failed, tried to do surgery on yourself? Or was it when you fled the country and the police barged into my apartment looking for you, or perhaps when I was taken to the police station and questioned like I was a criminal accessory. Or maybe it was when you were finally taken into custody, you returned all my letters unopened and wouldn't take my phone calls." House was quiet.

"A year, Greg; it's been a year since I've heard anything from you. You're my brother. We're family. We're supposed to rely on each other. Ever since you and Dr. Cuddy broke up, you've shut me out. I thought we were making progress last year just before you crashed into Cuddy's house. You were starting to open up and let me in, and then you disappeared. I was worried sick. The police harassed me every day until they took you into custody. I was relieved when you ended up in jail; at least I knew you were alive. So yeah, Greg. Hurt." Susan sighed and leaned back in her chair, "Greg, you're not alone anymore. You can always come to me. We're family."

House gave a half nod and glanced down toward the table, "I wasn't trying to hurt you," he said.

"Eat your sandwich," Susan replied with a sigh accepting his manner of apology.

House picked up his sandwich and took a bite. He closed his eyes savoring the taste. After he swallowed he said, "This is good."

"You must have been seriously deprived if you think that hospital cafeteria food is good," Susan said, "Why don't you come over tonight for a home cooked meal?"

"I can't," he answered.

"Why not?"

House leaned down and pulled up his pants leg showing the monitor to Susan. "I'm only allowed to go to work and go home."

"Do they really think you're going to run out and ram somebody else's window?"

"I don't have the best track record for staying out of trouble," House said. "House and work arrest is part of my parole." Susan nodded and reached for one of the fries on House's plate. "Aren't you eating?"

Susan shook her head, "I have a lunch meeting with one of our supply vendors in a half hour."

"So, if you're having lunch with somebody else, why did you meet me here?" House asked.

Susan said. "Greg, I may be upset with you, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see you; you're my brother. When you refused all contact with me, I decided to leave you alone and give you your space. I figured at some point, you'd come back around." Susan's pager went off, "Looks like my 'lunch date' is here early. I need to go. We'll continue this conversation later." Susan stood up and as she started to walk away, she put her hand on his shoulder, "I'm glad you're home." She left House to his lunch and made her way to the lobby.

House continued to eat his sandwich in silence while he thought about what Susan said. What she didn't know was that he hadn't refused her letters without purpose. When he received the first one, he quietly returned it to the mail room and requested that all personal mail for him be returned to sender knowing that the only personal mail he would receive would be from Susan.


	3. Chapter 3

CHAPTER THREE

Phillip lay sprawled out on the floor working on his homework when Susan walked in from work. "Hey Phillip, how was school?"

"It was school," he said shrugging his shoulders.

Susan put down her purse and sat down on the edge of the couch near Phillip's head, "Phillip?" He turned his head to look at her, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," he said.

"Are you sure?" she asked.

"I'm fine," he said and turned his attention back to his homework.

Susan stared at the back of his head for a moment and then got up and took her things into the bedroom. David was changing out of his suit when she walked in. She sat down on the edge of the bed and took off her shoes. "You know the bad thing about being the lab director now instead of just a tech?" she asked.

"What's that?"

"Having to wear business clothes," she said rubbing her feet. "I miss my walking shoes." David sat down on the end of the bed and pulled her feet up on his lap and started massaging. Susan laid back and closed her eyes, "That feels awesome," she said relaxing deeper into the mattress.

"Did you see House?" David asked.

"Ummhmm," Susan said with her eyes still closed.

"How is he?"

"He seems fine. He has an ankle monitor," she said. "I guess they don't trust him."

"Would you if you were in their shoes?" David asked.

"Probably not," Susan said. David shifted his attention to Susan's other foot.

Phillip finished his homework and put his books in his back pack. He heard his parents' voices as he passed by their door on the way up to his room. _His parents_, he thought to himself. _She's not really my mom, so she's not my parent._ He went to his room and shut the door.

Susan and David heard Phillip shut his door, "I guess he's finished with his homework," David said.

"Has he always been this way and I just didn't see it because I didn't live with you?" Susan asked.

"What way?" David asked.

"Aloof, quiet, curt – something along those lines; I can't really put a word to it," Susan answered.

"He's never been particularly loud," David said, "but does seem a little standoffish these days."

"Do you suppose it's something I've done or said?" Susan asked.

"Well, I can't imagine what," he answered. "I don't think you've ever said a cross word to him since we married."

"No, but somehow I feel like we had a better relationship before," Susan said. "I think as long as we were just dating, he was OK, but now that we're married I think he thinks I'm an intruder."

"Why would you say that?" David asked.

"I just feel like his whole attitude toward me has changed. Before we were married, he couldn't wait to tell me about what happened at school or on the baseball field. Now, he barely even says hi and answers my questions with one word answers." Susan said.

"I'll talk to him," David said. "He's not allowed to be disrespectful to you."

"Oh, no he's not being disrespectful, David, just aloof. I'm not trying to get him in trouble. Don't talk to him yet if you don't mind; maybe he just needs his space or more time to get used to me," Susan said.

"Okay, I'll follow your lead on this for now, but if he ever starts being disrespectful, I expect to be told. I won't have that behavior in my house," David said.

"Spoken like the 'man in charge'," Susan teased.

With that David tightened his grip on her ankles and began tickling her feet. Susan yelped while she squirmed and twisted to get out of his grip to escape and nearly succeeded when he grabbed her around the waist and pulled her back toward him. He quit tickling her and dropped on the bed next to her pulled her close and kissed her. He pulled his head back and ran his hand along her face, "I love you Susan."

"I know," she answered. "I love you too." Susan sat up, I better get dinner going. I'm sure your bottomless pit upstairs is beginning to wonder if he's going to get fed."

Phillip's room was right on top of his dad's. He heard Susan's yelp followed by their laughter and wondered what was so funny. He had to admit that since they got married, Dad seemed a lot happier. He wondered if he was that happy when his mom was alive. He wished he could remember his mom. Suddenly it was much quieter downstairs. He shook his head, they were probably kissing again. _Gross_, he thought to himself and turned his attention back to his video game.

MDMDMDMD

Phillip was loading the dishwasher while David put away the left-over's after Susan dished a few servings in plastic containers and put them in a paper bag. "Are you headed over to see House?" David asked.

"Yes, he is only allowed to be at work and home, so I thought I would take him some food." David nodded his agreement. "Phillip? Would you like to go with me to Greg's apartment?"

"No," Phillip answered. He put soap in the dishwasher and closed the door, then left the kitchen and went up to his room.

Susan didn't say anything as she watched him go upstairs. David started after him, but Susan grabbed his arm, "Please David, let him be. He needs time to deal with this."

"It's been nearly three months," David argued.

"Which isn't very long; don't worry, he'll come around," Susan said. She grabbed her purse, keys and the bag of food. "I'll be back in an hour or two," she said.

David watched her walk out the door and went into the living room. Now that it had been brought to his attention he realized Phillip's attitude toward Susan had progressively declined since the day they got married. He wasn't happy with Phillip's behavior and he wanted to get to the bottom of it, but because Susan asked, he decided to hold off a little longer. He couldn't understand Phillip's attitude at all. They got along so well before the wedding and even on the wedding day he seemed happy, but since then he had been growing more recluse. David switched on the television and settled in to watch a baseball game.

MDMDMDMDMD

House recognized the knock at the door, "Come in."

"Hey," Susan said as she walked inside. She came around the couch and sat on the opposite end and handed House the bag of food. House opened the bag and looked at the contents. He opened one of the containers and smelled the aroma; his mouth was starting to water. He looked at Susan and nodded and then put the bag on the coffee table in front of him. "Thought you might be hungry," Susan said.

"Always," he answered.

"And yet, you're not eating," Susan said.

"No fork."

Susan rolled her eyes and got up to go to the kitchen to get him a fork, "Anything else while I'm in here?" she asked.

"A drink," he said.

Susan looked in his refrigerator. The only drink in his refrigerator was beer. "Do you want water or one of these things?" she asked.

"One of _those things_ is fine," he answered.

Susan pulled the bottle out of the refrigerator and brought it to him with the fork and sat back down. House opened the beer and grabbed one of the containers. "So how have _you_ been?" she asked.

"Do you really want to know?" he asked.

"Of course I do," she said.

"Prison sucks," he answered as he took his first bite.

"I think that's the point," Susan retorted. "Anything else?"

"Not really. How long have you been married?"

"Almost three months."

"Big wedding?"

"No, just the minister, us and our children," Susan said.

"But you had a nice honeymoon," it was a question as much as a statement.

"Nope, we went home afterwards and to work the following Monday," Susan said. "We felt like we had waited long enough and finally just went through with it."

"What were you waiting on?" House asked.

"You," Susan said. House stopped chewing and looked straight at her waiting for her to explain. "I wanted you there. But then I heard through the grapevine that you caused a prison riot and your sentence was extended. David convinced me that we should go ahead because there was no way of knowing when you were getting out."

"I didn't know," House said after he swallowed.

"You would have…." Susan said and left the rest of the sentence hanging.

House was silent for a moment, then sighed having made his decision. "When you are in prison, you have to make alliances in order to survive, even more so if you are handicapped."

"So who did you ally yourself with?" Susan asked.

"Well, I wasn't as much an ally as put in a position of servitude."

"Servitude; you?"

"Sorta; I traded my knowledge of medicine and half of my daily allotment of vicodin to the leader of one of the gangs and in return they kept everybody else off my back," House explained.

"What kind of gang were they?"

"White racial extremists," he answered.

Susan's eyes opened wide, "You're not a racist, why did you choose them?"

"They ran the prison."

"So, are you one of their gang now?" Susan asked not sure what to think.

"No, it was purely a business arrangement, but not one without potential consequences if things didn't go well or I fell out of favor."

"Wouldn't the guards have protected you if they tried to attack?"

"Susan, a lot goes on that the guards don't know about and this was just a medium security prison. It's much worse in high security prisons. In any case the guards can't protect those outside the prison walls," House explained. "You should know me well enough to know that I never stay out of trouble for very long."

Susan stared at House for a moment while she absorbed what he just said. "Are you telling me that if you fell out of line, they would have come after me and Laura?"

"They couldn't know that I had anybody on the outside," he said.

"So by having my mail returned to me, you prevented them from knowing about us."

"The mailroom is run by prison staff and not prisoners because the mail is screened before it makes it inside. So, when I received the first letter, I talked to the guard and made sure that I wouldn't receive any personal mail."

"Doesn't change the fact that it hurt, but at least now I understand," Susan said.

"I had no contact from the outside; not even Wilson came to visit. Knowing that you cared enough to write had meaning," he said as he started rubbing his leg. He reached in his pocket, pulled out his vicodin and took two.

"So, they gave you vicodin in prison?" Susan asked. "I figured they'd take it away since you're an addict."

"No, they didn't take it away. I have legitimate pain and I was allowed medication for that pain. But they lowered my dosage to four per day and I had to give two of those to the gang leader."

"So basically, you were getting just enough to keep you from going through severe withdrawal, but not enough to deaden the pain to any great extent," Susan said. House nodded.

"Greg, I'd like to stay longer, but I need to get back," Susan said as she stood up.

"Yeah, gotta go be mommy to the kid," House said.

"Actually, I think he'd be fine if I dropped off the face of the earth."

"You mean not everything's perfect in marriage land?"

"Marriage land is fine, step-motherhood is lacking. He's just not dealing well with my continual presence. He'll come around eventually," Susan said. "Maybe it's a stage. I don't know anything about raising adolescent boys."

"How old is he?" House asked.

"Twelve."

"Well, when I was twelve I announced to my dad that I knew he wasn't my dad and then spent all summer locked in my room with notes passed under my door. My childhood isn't exactly a good example to draw from," House said. "What does lover boy say?"

"He wants to confront Phillip, but I've asked him to wait. I figure Phillip will come around on his own. I remember when Laura was twelve she spent most of her time alone in her room; though I don't remember her being so standoffish," Susan said.

"Maybe you need to take David's lead on this one," House said actually using David's name. "Like you said, you don't know anything about raising boys." House watched her as she moved around the couch and toward the door noticing a slight change since he'd last seen her a year before.

"See you tomorrow," Susan said as she opened the door and walked out.

House allowed himself a smirk and then turned his attention back to his dinner. He'd getter a better look tomorrow and then he'd be certain.

MDMDMDMDMDMD

"How was House?" David asked when Susan returned home.

"Subdued," Susan answered.

"How are you?"

"I'm fine. It's awkward right now, but it'll be ok."

"What do you mean by awkward?"

"It doesn't feel right. I don't feel like we're as close as we were, but I think it will resolve. By the way, he says that I should follow your lead with Phillip and let you talk to him," Susan said. "I was really thinking that Phillip would come around by himself, but maybe he needs that man to man interaction."

"Good," David said. "Sometimes Phillip can get a little touchy, but I can usually get whatever's bothering him out in the open."

I'm sorry, I should know better. You know your son much better than I do," Susan conceded.

David walked up to her and put his arms around her, "Don't worry, you're his mom now. It won't be long before you know him as well as any mother knows her son."


	4. Chapter 4

CHAPTER FOUR

"Phillip!" David called, "Hurry up or you're going to be late for school." Phillip made his way downstairs. "What's taking you so long?"

"Nothing," Phillip said swinging his backpack over his shoulder. "I'm ready, let's go." Phillip made his way to the door and David grabbed his briefcase and followed him out.

David started pulling out the driveway and into the street. He put the car in drive and started forward. "Son, we need to talk. I want to know what's going on with you."

"Nothing's going on with me Dad, I'm fine."

"No, that's not true. Your attitude has changed and I want to know why. In particular your attitude toward your mother," David said. "I thought you liked Susan."

Phillip cringed when he heard David call Susan his mother, "I like her fine."

"Then why are you acting so indifferent toward her? She's your mom, you should treat her with respect," David said.

"I wish you would quit calling her 'mom'," Phillip answered. "At most she's my stepmom, not my mom."

"Mom, stepmom; it doesn't matter. She's my wife and the closest thing you have to a mother. Life is better for us since she came into our lives. She cares for you and you're acting like a jerk toward her. I want the attitude to stop," David said.

"Better for you maybe," Phillip said.

"What is that supposed to mean?" David asked.

"Right, like you don't know. You got everything you wanted, but you didn't bother to ask me what I wanted. You didn't ask me if I even wanted another mom. We were fine together and now you spend all your time with her."

"Phillip, we've been married for less than three months and during all that time, you've been in school. We haven't had time to do things together yet. Even Susan and I haven't been able to go on a honeymoon or anything. Phillip, I wasn't planning on stopping the things that you and I do, but I also would like for us to do things together as a family. Susan is a wonderful woman and I love her. I know she'll make a good mom if you'll just give her the chance," David said.

Phillip stayed silent and stared out the window. The school came into view and Phillip grabbed his backpack off the floorboard of the car. When David pulled up, Phillip unbuckled his seatbelt and opened the door. David put his hand on Phillip's arm, "Son, just because I married Susan doesn't mean that I love you any less. We'll still do things together, just us. I promise."

Phillip stepped out of the car without replying, shut the door and started walking toward the school. David saw one of Phillip's buddies from his baseball team walk up alongside and together they make their way up the steps. David watched his son walk away until the car behind him honked for him to move along. David pressed the accelerator and headed toward the University.

MDMDMDMDM

"So what's wrong with you?" Jerrod asked.

"Dad was trying to talk me into liking Susan," Phillip said.

"Yeah, my dad was always doing that too when he married my stepmom. Fat chance of that happening, I hate her," Jerrod said.

"I don't hate Susan," Phillip said.

"Give it time, you will," Jerrod said. "Just wait until she starts telling you what to do or what to wear or who your friends should be. I wish I could go live with my mom right now, she was way cool. She didn't care about anything and most of the time she was gone all night and I could do whatever I wanted. It was great. This summer I'm going to tell my dad that I'm going back to live with mom. I'll be thirteen and the judge will let me decide what I want to do."

"Well, my real mom is dead so I don't have any choice about where to live like you do," Phillip said.

"That sucks man," Jerrod said.

"Yeah it does, my real mom was awesome."

MDMDMDMDMD

Wilson pulled up to House's apartment and got out of his car. He knocked and heard House grab his backpack as he made his way to the door. Together they walked out the foyer and out toward Wilson's car. "How's the jaw?" Wilson asked staring at the bruise he'd created on the side of House's face when he punched him the other evening.

"Healing, thanks," House said.

"I'm sorry I hit you," Wilson said.

"No you're not," House said looking at him out of the corner of his eye. "I deserved it," he said as he faced back forward. They got in the car and Wilson headed out.

"How are the car repairs going?" Wilson said. "Or are you finally going to junk that old heap and buy something new?"

"I can't replace that car, we've got history," House said. "She's got lots of miles left in her."

Wilson shook his head in disbelief, "You'd think you'd opt for a bit of change after everything you've been through in the last year. A new car would do you good, as would a haircut for that matter."

"What are you, my mother?" House said. "There's nothing wrong with my hair."

"Except that in the last year you've lost most everything on top and back and you're growing it long everywhere else to make up for it," Wilson said. "It looks ridiculous."

"You're just jealous," House said.

"Jealous? I have a full head of hair. I've got nothing to be jealous about." Wilson said.

"Just means you don't have as much testosterone as I do," House said.

"Hair loss has nothing to do with testosterone levels. It's your body's reaction to the testosterone that you have that makes you lose your hair," Wilson said. "Besides, there's nothing wrong with my testosterone level."

"How would you know? Did you have it tested?" House asked. Wilson looked away sheepishly. "You did! Why?" House asked, "Your girlish part taking over?"

"Because I wasn't losing any hair," Wilson said quietly.

House crossed his arms in front him and smirked.

"Jerk," Wilson said.

"Moron," House replied.

MDMDMDMDMD

"You can't be serious," Susan said.

"I'm afraid so," Foreman said. "If we're going to put a diagnostics department back together, the money has to come from somewhere, which means every department has to contribute – even the laboratory."

"Just what do you expect me to cut back?" Susan said. "I've already cut our operating budget 20% since I started. There isn't any room to maneuver."

"Susan, this isn't a negotiation. You have to cut your department's budget by another 5%. If you can't do it with supplies and equipment then you'll have to let people go…"

"I'm not firing anybody," Susan said defensively. "I have a good crew and they work well together. They're already pushed to the limit, if I let anybody go, that'll mean overtime trying to get everything done. You know that's more expensive and risks burnout for the employees that are left. It's not like lab techs and phlebotomists get paid much of anything anyway. You should cut those six figure doctor salaries before you cut people that are living paycheck to paycheck."

"Then you better find another source to cut back. As much as I regret saying it, we need House back here and in order for House to work, he needs a team," Foreman said.

"You don't regret having House back; you like that he's back and you like that you're _his_ boss now instead of the other way around. You're also expecting House's presence to bring back some of the donors," Susan said. Foreman didn't reply. "OK fine, I'll see what I can do. However, when those donors start coming back, I expect the lab to get a piece of the pie. We need new and better instruments and equipment instead of limping along with what we have. Duck tape and string will only hold us together for so long." Susan got up and made her way out of the office just as House was walking in, "I hope you appreciate what everybody else has to do to get you functioning again."

House stared at her back as she made her way to the elevators, and then turned toward Foreman, "When is Park's hearing?"

"Couple weeks, the date hasn't actually been set yet," Foreman said. House turned back the direction Susan had gone and turned back around, "Just what are you asking Susan to do?"

"She needs to cut her department back 5%."

"The lab already operates on a minimal budget as it is," House admitted. "There isn't room for them to cut back."

"If you want a department, then everybody has to cut back, including the lab. If every department cuts back 5%, then we should have enough money saved up in a year for your department," Foreman said.

"A year?" House said. "It's going to be a year before I can get a team in here?"

"You have Park and Adams, well at least for as long as Adams wants to hang around," Foreman said.

"Assuming that Park doesn't get canned at the disciplinary hearing; which she _shouldn't _by the way," House emphasized.

"I can't discuss the hearing or anything related to it until it's over," Foreman said. "The board will make its decision when it hears all the evidence. Until then, the subject is off limits." The phone rang and Foreman reached to pick it up, "Go to work House."

House left Foreman's office, but he didn't go to his. Instead, he hit the down button on the elevator and made his way to the laboratory. Susan's office had a door to the hall and another door to the lab; he came in from the hall and moved a chair next to Susan to see what she was looking at on her computer screen, "Balance sheet," he observed.

"I update it every month so I can see where I am," Susan said.

"Where do you get all the numbers?" he asked.

Susan glanced at him, "You are kidding, right?" House shook his head. "I asked accounting to give me the numbers when I was first put in this position and I've kept it up on my own since that time. It's not rocket science. I know what I spend and what I have to pay for my people and how much of the hospital overhead I'm responsible for, so it's not hard to put together." Susan scrolled down the spread sheet, "I need to find where I can cut another two percent."

"I thought you had to cut the budget by five," House said.

"You know that lunch meeting I had yesterday?" Susan asked. House nodded, "It was with one of my major supply vendors. I haven't told Foreman yet, but I negotiated enough of a discount out of them to cut my budget by three percent, and got a free lunch out of it at the same time." Susan switched screens to her test menu and started scrolling through the tests. "I was able to promise him we'd buy the reagents for all these tests from him," she said as she was highlighting them, "and with the volume of these tests that we run, I was able to get bigger discounts."

"What about these tests?" House pointed to several that she left un-highlighted.

"They don't carry the reagents for those. They're pretty obscure tests and not ordered very often, in fact I may drop them," Susan said.

"You can't do that, they may be obscure but when they're needed, they're needed," he said.

"Then we can outsource them to another lab out of that department's budget. Look, I have to cut my budget five percent to keep you functioning. If it means I drop a few tests, then I drop a few tests. You've seen the numbers, I don't have anything else to pull from," Susan argued.

"You could drop a couple of employees…," House started.

"Don't even go there," Susan interrupted. "If you've learned anything about me at all, you know I'm not about to screw up people's lives if I don't have to. These aren't rich doctors in here; they are working as hard as they can from paycheck to paycheck to make ends meet. It's not their fault that Foreman sucks at soliciting donations." There was a knock at the door to the lab. Both House and Susan looked up.

"Oh, Dr. House, I didn't know you were in here, I'll come back," the tech started to turn around.

"Wait Jason," Susan said. "What do you need?"

Jason kept his eyes on Dr. House while talking to Susan, "We're out of large gloves."

"You're kidding," Susan said. "We just counted inventory yesterday and there were two cases."

Jason shrugged, "I've turned the supply closet upside down and there are no large gloves."

"Go to the nurse's station and see if you can borrow a box. We'll pay it back when our order comes in Friday," Susan said. Jason finally looked away from Dr. House and glanced at Susan. He nodded and then headed left to go track down some gloves. Susan looked over at House and got up, "I've got a feeling that more than just two cases of large gloves are missing." Susan grabbed her inventory sheet out of a pile on her desk and started out the door. She turned back around, "I just realized I don't know why you came down here."

"You mean I have to have a reason?" House asked looking at her intently.

Susan smiled, "No, but I know better."

House smirked.

"That's what I thought. Did you get what you came for?" Susan asked.

House acknowledged her by getting up and heading out the door. Susan turned and walked through the lab to the supply closet and went inside. She started comparing the numbers on her list to the inventory on the shelves. The only thing missing was the large gloves. It seemed a rather odd item to disappear, every department had their own allotment of gloves and purchasing hadn't said anything about shortages. She realized that money was tight all around, but there was no way that departments should be so tied up that they felt the need to steal supplies from each other. Susan made notations on her inventory sheet to order another two cases for Friday's shipment.

MDMDMDMDMD

The lunch bell rang and Phillip headed to the cafeteria stopping at his locker along the way to pull his lunch out of his backpack. He found a seat next to Jerrod, sat down and opened his bag. Inside was a chicken salad sandwich, a hand full of tortilla chips an apple and a bag of cookies. Phillip opened the bag of cookies first and Jerrod promptly took them away. "Your stepmom wouldn't want you eating your desert before your meal. I'll just hang on to these for you." Phillip looked his direction, but didn't say anything. This was the third day this week that Jerrod had stolen the cookies from his lunch. He reached down in his bag for his sandwich and started eating. As he took a bite he had to admit to himself that since Susan had moved in, his lunches had improved remarkably. She was a much better cook than dad; she could even make chicken salad taste good.

After lunch Phillip headed to his next class, math. He actually liked math and his teacher was really pretty, so he didn't mind going to class at all. He sat down in his chair and pulled his homework out of his bag. He pulled out his text and some fresh paper and started copying today's assignment from the marker board. Ms. Rogers came in and called for the students' homework. Phillip got up and moved to the front of the class. He reached Ms. Rogers desk and suddenly didn't feel well. He leaned over her trashcan and emptied his stomach. A collective groan came from the class. Ms. Rogers asked one of the students to get a cup of water and she went around and stood by Phillip with her hand on his shoulder until he was finished. The student arrived with the cup and she handed it to Phillip so he could wash out his mouth and then she handed him a Kleenex to clean his face, "Are you OK now?" she asked.

Phillip nodded, "I think so. I'm sorry."

"You have nothing to be sorry for; go on down to the nurses office and she'll call your father to pick you up."

Phillip went back to his desk to get his backpack feeling every eye in the classroom on him. As he passed Jerrod's desk, he heard him whisper, "It's your stepmom. She's trying to poison you."

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan's cell phone vibrated in her pocket. She pulled it out and noted David on the caller ID. "Hey," she said when she answered it.

"Are you doing anything, can you get away?" David asked with a rather rushed tone.

"Nothing that I can't put off and yes if necessary, what's up?" Susan responded noting the tone of his voice.

"Phillip is sick at school and I'm stuck in a meeting with the academic dean."

"I should be able to get away. Let me call Dr. Foreman and I'll send you a text when I'm headed out," she said.

"Thanks."

Susan ended the call with David, picked up her office phone and called Foreman, "I need to leave. I need to pick up Phillip at school." She paused listening, "I don't know the details yet, just that he's sick and needs picked up." She paused again, "I can log in to the hospital system from home and finish the report from there. I'll email it to you when I'm finished," another pause. "OK, thanks." Susan hung up and grabbed her things. She walked in the lab and announced that she had to leave, but that she would be accessible by email and phone should any issues arise and headed out.

Thirty minutes later, Susan pulled up in front of the school and went into the front office. "I'm here to pick up Phillip James please," she said.

"I need to see your ID," the receptionist said. Susan pulled out her wallet and retrieved her driver's license and handed it over.

"Ms. Watkins, you're not on the list as approved individuals to pick up Phillip," she said.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I'm recently married to David and I haven't had a chance to go to the DMV and have my license updated with my new name. I'm Susan James."

"You're name still isn't on the approved list," the receptionist said. "I'm afraid I can't let you take Phillip."

"Oh for crying out loud," Susan said as she pulled her phone out of her pocket and dialed David. She wasn't able to get through, so she called David's parents. They weren't home and then she remembered they were traveling this month and they didn't have a cell phone. "Where is Phillip?" she asked the receptionist as she put her phone back into her pocket.

"He's in the nurses office, but you can't go see him if you're not on the approved list," the receptionist said.

"What about if Phillip tells you who I am, would that be OK?" Susan asked.

"I'm sorry, but no," the receptionist said.

"I realize you have your security policies in place for a reason, but he's sick and if he….."

At that moment Susan heard Phillip in the hallway and turned toward the sound of his voice, "I want to go home, where's my dad?" The nurse was following him to the receptionist office.

"Phillip, you need to wait in my office until your dad comes, you can't be walking the hallways when you're sick," the nurse said grabbing his arm to take him back to her office.

Phillip jerked his arm away from the nurse, "Leave me alone, I want to go home." Just as Phillip made it to the receptionist office, he doubled over in pain. Susan realized what was happening and only just managed to get a trash can in place. She looked at the receptionist, "Would you please get me a wet rag?" Susan rubbed his back while Phillip heaved.

"I hate this," he said between heaves.

"I know, I'm sorry," Susan said. The receptionist handed over the rag and Susan wiped his face when he was finished. Susan looked at the receptionist and said, "I'm taking him home. Don't bother trying to stop me. Come on Phillip." Susan wrapped her arm around Phillip's waist and led him to her car. Phillip got in the car and leaned against the door. He was very pale and was shaking. Susan reached over and felt his neck with the back of her hand. He was burning up. "Let's get you home."

Susan drove as quickly as she was able and pulled in the driveway 15 minutes later. She got out of the car and went around to the other side and opened the door. Phillip was still weak from his last bout of nausea, so she helped him out of the car and to the house. When they got inside she said, "Why don't you go lay down in our bedroom so you don't have to climb upstairs and a bathroom is close by. I'll go upstairs and get you a t-shirt and your pajama bottoms to change into." Phillip headed toward his parent's bedroom and Susan ran upstairs. She walked in his room and pulled open the drawers to search for his night clothes. In the first drawer she opened, she found his underwear. She decided to take a couple pair with her. If this illness was typical of the standard stomach flu, the nausea was just the beginning and there might be other unpleasant issues right around the corner. She found his pajama bottoms and a t-shirt and headed back downstairs. She walked in the bedroom and found Phillip already lying down. She pulled off his shoes and socks. "Do you want me to help you change?" she asked. Phillip didn't answer, so Susan took that as a yes and helped him out of his clothes and into his pajama bottoms and t-shirt. He didn't resist. She went to the bathroom and dampened a wash cloth with cool water while she located the thermometer. When she got back to the bedroom, Phillip had fallen asleep. She put the thermometer in his ear and listened for the beep; 103°F. _Great_, she thought to herself. She used the damp cloth to cool his face and neck then got up to get some acetaminophen to knock the fever down somewhat. She knew it was important to allow some fever as this was the body's way of fighting the bug, but 103° was too high for her comfort. She would feel better if she could get it down a couple of degrees. Her cell phone rang, "Hey," she said when she answered.

"How's Phillip?" David asked.

"Very sick," Susan answered. "He's asleep in our room at the moment. His temperature is 103° and his stomach is upset. You should know that I practically abducted him from the school when I picked him up," Susan said. "They weren't being very cooperative and if Phillip hadn't started heaving again right in front of them, I'd probably still be there arguing."

"I know. I just got off the phone with the principle. This was my fault, I didn't even think about the school pick up procedures and adding you to the list," David said. "It's fixed now, so there won't be an issue in the future."

Noise erupted from the bedroom, "Uh oh, gotta go," Susan said dropping the phone on the bed on her way through to the bathroom. "Hey kiddo," she said. She wet another rag and held his head and patted his back until he was finished. Another smell came to her attention just as Phillip realized another issue had occurred while his head was over the toilet.

He groaned, "I'm sorry," he whispered.

"There's no reason to be sorry. You can't keep everything under control when your stomach is heaving. Here, let's get you cleaned up." Susan helped him into the shower and washed him down. She brought him the underclothes she had brought down for him and let him change averting her eyes to give him a moment of privacy. She helped him back in bed and then picked up her phone speed dialing David. "When are you going to be able to leave work?" she asked.

"In about an hour or so," David answered.

"I'm going to call Greg. I want you to drop by the pharmacy on your way home and pick up some children's chewable Tylenol and whatever prescriptions are there. Oh, and run by the grocery and pick up some Gatorade and some pretzels or something like that."

"He can swallow a pill," David said.

"I don't doubt it, but he's not going to be able to hold anything down and a chewable tablet may stand more of a chance of staying down long enough to start working than a tablet or capsule," she explained.

David thought that was a good idea and agreed to pick up the supplies on his way home. He was so glad that Susan was there. He always felt so helpless when Phillip was sick, but Susan seemed to have a handle on things. He was glad to follow her lead. He pulled up the report he was working on and finished the last paragraph so he could leave.

MDMDMDMD

The phone vibrated in his pocket. House pulled it out and answered, "House".

"I need some help," Susan said. "Phillip's sick."

"I can't go anywhere, you'll have to bring him to the emergency room," House said.

"I don't think we need the emergency room, he seems to have just picked up a stomach bug," Susan said. "I was wondering if you would prescribe an antiemetic." Susan continued describing his symptoms and what she had done so far. She also told him that she was sending David by the drug store on his way home to pick up a few things.

"If he's not holding anything down, the antiemetic isn't going to stay in his system long enough to start working," House said.

"I know, but he has issues on the other side too, so I'm not sure how well a suppository is going to work either," Susan said. "Besides, I don't think he's going to be too amenable to having either of us giving him his medication that way."

House thought for a minute, "Have David come by my office instead of going to the drug store," and hung up. He got up from his desk and went to the hospital pharmacy and started rooting around for the items he needed.

"What are you doing House?" the pharmacist asked.

"Looking for your compounding equipment," House said.

The pharmacist pulled out her mortar and pestle, a glass plate, spatula, "anything else?"

House spouted off the ingredients he needed and the pharmacist gathered the supplies.

"You know, I can do that for you," the pharmacist said.

"But then it wouldn't have my magic touch," House said. The pharmacist rolled her eyes and went back to her computer to check on any new orders.

House finished the cream, put it in a jar and labeled it. Leaving the mess behind, he walked out.

David was already standing in House's office watching the orthopedic doctor remove somebody's cast when House walked in his office, "Susan said you wanted me to come by your office."

House handed him the jar and explained how to use it. "It has both an antiemetic and an antipyretic in it, so you won't need anything else for the fever."

MDMDMDMD

Half an hour later, David walked in the house and gave the jar of cream to Susan and took the rest of the supplies to the kitchen. He filled a glass with Gatorade and put a handful of pretzel sticks in a plastic container and headed to the bedroom. Susan had put some of the cream on the inside of his arm just above the hand and told Phillip to rub it in. David tried to get him to drink, but Phillip refused, "You need to drink Phillip, you'll get dehydrated."

Phillip shook his head, "I don't want to throw up anymore."

"That's what this medicine is for," Susan said. "House mixed it up for you." Phillip looked at his arm where he had rubbed in the cream. Susan noted the question in his eyes, "it absorbs through the skin. It'll help with the nausea."

"House said it had something in it for the fever as well," David added. "I'll tell you what, let's give the medicine about a half hour to start working and then try to drink something." Phillip nodded his agreement and then lay back down and closed his eyes.

Susan looked at David, "Can you stay with him? I need to finish a report for Dr. Foreman." David nodded and Susan left the room.

When Susan walked out of the room, Phillip opened his eyes and looked at his dad, "Dad," he whispered.

"Yes son," David sat down next to Phillip on the bed.

"I think Susan got me sick," he said.

"Why would you think that?"

"I got sick right after lunch," Phillip explained.

"Did you have the chicken salad sandwich?" David asked. Phillip nodded. "Then that wasn't it, I had it too and I'm not sick."

"Maybe she put something in mine," he said.

"That's nonsense. Susan would never hurt you on purpose. She cares about you."

"She cares about _you_," Phillip said. "I'm just in the way."

"Phillip that's crazy," David said. "I don't want to hear any more talk like that. You've just picked up a stomach bug, that's all. You'll feel a lot better in just a few hours."

"Will you stay with me?"

"I'm not going anywhere," David brushed Phillip's hair away from his face. "Try to rest." Phillip closed his eyes. David got up and sat in the chair in the bedroom. He sat back and watched as Phillip drifted off. Hopefully he would sleep for a long time so his body could concentrate on fighting the virus. _Why would he say something like that?_ David thought to himself. He thought about their conversation in the car. When he dropped Phillip off at school, he was pretty sure that it was just a jealousy issue and in time it would resolve itself. Now he wasn't so sure. What could possibly have happened to make Phillip think that Susan was trying to hurt him? He heard Susan walk in and he looked up. She handed him a glass of tea.

"How is he?"

"He just fell asleep," David paused with an odd look on his face.

"What is it?" Susan asked.

"He has some crazy notion that you made him sick," David said.

"I made him sick? Why would he think that?"

"Because he got sick right after he ate lunch," David explained.

"Oh, well the first thing that popped in my head when you called was food poisoning, but I knew that wasn't it because I had the chicken salad too and I'm fine. Did you eat yours?" Susan asked.

"Yes."

"I'm sure he's just picked up a stomach bug, it is that time of year," Susan said.

"Oh, I'm sure that's what it is as well. It just bothers me that he would consider the possibility that you would do something to him on purpose."

"He's been really standoffish to me since we got married. I really just figured that he was trying to adjust to my continual presence. After all, you guys have been bachelors for 10 years," Susan said.

"And after our conversation this morning, I just thought he was jealous that I was spending time with you and not with just him," David said. "There is more going on here than either of these things. Maybe I need to set him up with a counselor."

Susan nodded, "That might not be a bad idea." Susan leaned down and kissed David, "I need to finish that report." She turned to leave the room.

"Susan?" Susan stopped at the door and looked toward David, "Please don't take this personal; we'll figure it out."

"It _is_ personal David, but I'm not worried."


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER FIVE

Wilson cut into his steak and took a bite, "Mmm," he said. He finished chewing and swallowed, "I've really missed steak."

"Obviously, this is the second day in a row you've brought it," House replied.

"Are you complaining?"

"Not hardly; beats the heck out of chicken strips and fake potatoes or mystery meat," House said with his mouth full. He reached for the remote and flipped the channel.

"Hey! I was watching that."

"Not anymore," House said as he changed the channel to Ice Road Truckers.

Wilson rolled his eyes and settled in to watch as he finished his steak. "These people are insane," he said as he watched a truck barrel down the ice sideways.

MDMDMDMDMD

"Susan!"

Susan quickly set her laptop on the coffee table and rushed into the bedroom. David and Phillip were in the bathroom. Phillip was on the floor convulsing. Susan knelt down, "Don't hold him; just keep him from hurting himself." David sat on the floor near Phillip's head to keep him from slamming it into the bathtub. Phillip kicked out repeatedly slamming his feet into Susan's thighs as she knelt on the floor. She shifted over and placed her hand gently on his leg, "What happened?"

"He was sick again and then just as he finished, he passed out. I barely caught him before he hit the floor and then he started convulsing."

Phillip's fit started slowing down until it finally stopped. His eyes were open, but he wasn't seeing anything, "Phillip?" Susan asked. He didn't answer. "Phillip?" this time it was David. Phillip rolled his eyes toward his dad and tried to talk. It wasn't coherent.

Susan pulled out her phone and punched a number, "This isn't a stomach bug."

MDMDMDMDMD

The driver careened off the side of the ice road right over the top of a crack that had started to develop in the ice, the music cued and the television went to commercial, "Why do they always do that?" Wilson said to nobody in particular.

"To give you time to get up and get us another beer," House said.

Wilson looked over at House, "Right," he said and then got up and headed to the kitchen. House's phone rang. "Don't recognize that ring tone." Wilson called from the kitchen. "Who is it?"

"Susan," House answered as he opened the phone to answer it. "House," He listened and closed the phone. "Take me to the hospital."

Wilson set the beers down on the coffee table and grabbed his keys. House got up and followed Wilson out the door.

House and Wilson arrived in the ER before Susan got there with David and Phillip. When they finally came through the door, David was cradling Phillip in his arms as well as he could for his size. An orderly ran over with a gurney and David lay Phillip down. The orderly pushed the gurney into position in the ER bypassing other patients waiting in the ER waiting room. Two nurses moved Susan and David out of the way while they started checking vitals and announcing the stats out loud. House stood back and listened to the numbers while he observed. Finally the nurses finished their immediate task and an aid came over to dress Phillip in a gown. When David carried him in, he'd just been wrapped in a blanket and wearing only his t-shirt and underwear as he had soiled his pajama bottoms. If he'd been aware of what was going on, he'd have been very embarrassed. Susan stood quietly watching and absorbing everything she could, David paced back and forth. House turned toward David, "Would you sit down? You're getting annoying."

Susan put her hand on David's arm, "Let's sit down over here and let them do their work." Susan guided him over to the side and sat down next to him holding his hand.

House moved into position and started his exam. After several moments he said, "Call Park and Adams and get him moved into pediatric ICU."

"What's wrong with him?" David asked standing up and moving toward House.

"Don't know," House said as he turned and left.

"What does he mean he doesn't know?" David stopped and turned to look at Susan.

"Just exactly what he said," Susan said as she stood up and walked to her husband. "I know it's hard, but try to put your mind at ease, if anybody can figure out what is wrong with him, it's Greg."

The staff prepared to move Phillip to ICU in the pediatric department and soon they were headed out of ER. David and Susan started to follow when they were stopped at the front desk, "Susan, we're going to need you or your husband to go to admitting and fill out some paperwork. Susan looked at David, "He's in good hands, let's go take care of that while they're getting him settled." David watched the staff continue down the hall with his son. He felt so helpless. He looked at Susan with tears in his eyes. Susan picked up his hand and held it, "Come on. The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can be with him. He's in good hands," she repeated.

"Why don't you take care of that and I'll go with them?" David asked.

"I can't David; I'm sorry" Susan said. "I don't have any parental rights and I don't know all the answers; not yet anyway."

David looked down the hall again as the gurney entered the elevator and the door shut behind them. He looked at Susan, "Ok." Susan led him to admitting where they went through the arduous process of providing insurance and basic medical history. Susan learned that Phillip didn't have any medical allergies that they knew of and nothing extraordinary from his medical past. He'd had chicken pox when he was small and all of his vaccinations were current. He had the typical illnesses when he was small: ear infections, respiratory infections, one slight case of pneumonia that was caught early and didn't even require hospitalization. Finally they were finished with all the questions and the clerk printed off the documents for David to sign. "I'm sorry," David said to Susan. "I just never thought of all this when we got married. We need to get you listed as his legal guardian."

"Don't worry about it," Susan said. "It hasn't been that long and we have other things to think about right now. We'll take care of all that when this is over."

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Adams and Park were examining the patient when David and Susan walked in. "Where's House?" David asked. Neither doctor was able to answer his question. "How can he see to my son, if he's not here?"

"That's not the way he works David," Susan said. "Don't worry; he's fully aware of what is going on."

"He can't be fully aware if he isn't here!"

"Trust me," Susan said. "He knows."

David moved to Phillip's side and grabbed his hand, "Phillip?" Phillip opened his eyes and looked toward his father. "It's going to be OK."

"Look at me now Phillip," Park said. She shined a light in his eyes. "Pupils normal and equally reactive," she said. Having completed that assessment, she moved on to his arms and legs. "Phillip, can you feel this?" Phillip didn't answer.

"Phillip," David said. "Answer the question. Can you feel what she is doing?"

Phillip looked at his dad and back at Dr. Park, "No." He closed his eyes.

"Phillip, squeeze my hand," Dr. Park said. Phillip didn't respond.

"Phillip, squeeze her hand," David repeated. Phillip opened his eyes and looked at Dr. Park, but didn't respond.

Adams held out a pencil, "Phillip reach for the pencil with your left hand." Phillip put his hand out and grabbed the pencil. "Now, look at me and reach out and hold your dad's hand." Nothing. "Ok, look at your hand and reach out and hold your dad's hand." Phillip found his dad's hand. Dr. Park repeated a similar test with his left leg and foot. "Loss of proprioception on his left side."

"Whatever it is, it's neurological," Park said. Park and Adams left the room to report to House leaving Susan and David alone with Phillip.

Phillip looked at his dad and Susan. When his eyes fell on Susan, he started to speak. He was hard to understand but Susan caught what he was trying to say, "No Phillip, that's not true."

David looked at Susan, "What did he say?" Susan just shook her head not wanting to repeat the comment.

"He said that she poisoned him," House said as he entered the room. "You're his dad, can't you understand him?"

"Greg please; that's not helping," Susan said.

"No kid. Susan hasn't poisoned you," House said.

"Do you know what it is?" David asked.

"I know what it's not and it's not poison," House answered. House pulled a couple of tubes out of his pocket along with a phlebotomy kit. He looked at Susan, "you want to do this?"

Susan shook her head, "He already thinks I poisoned him, I'm not going to help the situation by sticking a needle in his arm. You do it."

"Too bad for you kid, she's a lot better at it than I am," House said. After he pulled the blood, he wrote an order on the chart. "How much of that cream has he had?"

"Just the first dose," Susan said.

House wrote something else on the chart and then left the room, stopping by the nurse's station to say something as he headed down the hall. The nurse came into the room and added some medication to the IV bag.

"What is that?" David asked.

"Something for the nausea," she answered. She gave Phillip a pat on the arm, "the medicine will start working in just a minute." The nurse left and Susan started to walk out of the room as well.

"Where are you going?" David asked.

"Thought I'd go down to the lab to see what House ordered and get it started," Susan said.

"Can't your people do it? I'd rather you stay here," David said.

"Sure they can, but I wasn't sure Phillip wanted me around. He might be more comfortable with me out of the room," Susan said looking at Phillip who was averting his eyes.

David looked at Phillip, "Son, I wish I understood where this mistrust was coming from. Susan would never do anything to hurt you. Do you want her to stay or to go?"

Phillip looked at his dad, "go," he said.

Susan nodded and walked out of the room. She made her way down to her office and sat in her chair at her desk. As hard as she tried, it was impossible for her eyes not to fill with tears although she managed to keep them from running down her face. The light flipped on, "No reason to be sitting in the dark," House said.

"Don't need the light on either," Susan said. "I'm not trying to see anything."

"Just hiding," he answered.

"If I was hiding, I wouldn't have come to my office," Susan said. "I'm just acquiescing to my son's wishes."

"Apparently, he's not your son," House said.

"Well, he doesn't seem to want me to be anyway," Susan conceded with a sigh. "Do you know what's wrong with him?"

"Not yet, the blood work will help but I'm also ordering a CT, an LP and a full tox screen."

"Just in case I am poisoning him?" Susan asked with some hostility in her voice.

"Just in case he's poisoned himself," House said. "Do you have any reason to believe he's doing drugs?"

Susan shook her head, "No, not drugs. But he's been pretty curt with me ever since we got married. I really don't know where this is coming from; we got along really well before. Now he thinks I made him sick because he got sick right after he ate lunch."

House sat for a moment, "How long after?"

"I don't know for sure, but definitely within an hour. He was in his first class after lunch when David was called to pick him up. Greg, all three of us had chicken salad sandwiches. I made it fresh this morning and neither David nor I have gotten sick. It's not food poisoning," Susan said.

"No, it's not. But that doesn't mean you didn't get him sick. Is there any left?"

"Yes," Susan answered.

"Go home and bring it here – and while you're at it, bring me something to eat too," House said.

Susan nodded and got up. She went to Phillip's room and peaked in the door. Phillip was asleep and David was sitting by his side holding his hand. When he saw her, he stood up and came over to her, "Susan, I don't know what to say, I'm so sorry."

"Don't worry about that now, we'll deal with it later. I'm headed home; Greg wants me to bring the left-over chicken salad to him in my old lab."

"What's he testing it for?"

"I'm not sure," Susan said. "Does he have any food allergies?"

"Not that we've ever discovered," he answered.

"Well anyway, that's where I'm going. Are you planning on sleeping here all night?" Susan asked.

"I don't want to leave him," David said.

"Then I'll pick you up a change of clothes for tomorrow."

David stepped out in the hall with Susan and walked her to the elevator, "Susan, I…"

Susan looked up at him and saw the emotion. She put her hand on his cheek, "It's OK. We'll work through this together. I love you and I love Phillip too."

David pulled her close and kissed her. The elevator opened and Susan stepped inside, "I'll be back in about an hour."

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Susan pulled up in front of the house and went inside. First she went to their bedroom and pulled out David's overnight bag and pulled out clothes for the next day. She grabbed his travel pack from under the sink in the bathroom and threw in his toothbrush, shaver and deodorant as well as some shampoo he'd swiped from the last hotel he'd visited. That complete, she went to the kitchen. She pulled out the plastic container she had put the leftover chicken salad in and set it on the table, then set about fixing something for Greg and David to eat. She searched her cabinet and noticed she had everything she needed for spaghetti. It wasn't fancy, but it was quick and easy. She fried up the hamburger while the spaghetti was boiling. The hamburger finished about the time the spaghetti was softened. She pulled a jar of sauce from her pantry to add to the mixture. Normally, she would have fixed homemade sauce, but there really wasn't time and this would do in a pinch. Susan packed it up in an insulated casserole dish, grabbed the overnight bag and the chicken salad and headed to the hospital.

Once at the hospital, Susan dropped by the cafeteria to get drinks and the rest of what they would need for dinner and then headed to Greg's office. He wasn't in there, so she left the food on his desk and then headed to pediatrics. "David?" she said when she got to the door.

"Come on in," he said.

"He's still asleep," she observed. David nodded. She set the overnight bag on the floor next to the chair David was sitting on. "I brought you something to eat; it's in Greg's office."

"I'm not hungry," he said.

"Actually, you probably are, you just don't realize it. You haven't had anything since lunch and it's almost midnight. Please, go eat your dinner. I'll sit with him until you get back," Susan said. David looked at Phillip and all the tubing and equipment hooked up to his son.

"How are you staying so calm with all this?" David asked. "I mean, I know he's not your biological son, but I know you love him and with him saying these things... It has to hurt."

"Of course it does," Susan admitted, "but I know that deep down he knows better. If he was really afraid, he wouldn't have let me take him home from school or take care of him until you got home. Let's just get him well." Susan looked over at the monitors and watched Phillip as he slept, "He's going to be asleep for a while. He's exhausted and with the medication Greg's giving him, he'll probably sleep for several more hours. It'll be OK for you to take a break." David nodded and then got up and left the room. Susan sat down in the chair that David had just vacated. "Ok kiddo, it's just you and me for a while." She sat watching him breathe as he slept. Facially, he looked so much like David, it was uncanny. She'd seen photos of his mother; she was very pretty. Phillip had her eyes and hair color, but the rest was all David. It was sad that Phillip was too young when she died to remember her. Susan wondered what kind of relationship she and Phillip would have together once they got through this crisis. She sincerely hoped that it would improve. She'd been denied more children after Laura and she always wanted a son too. She really wanted her and Phillip to develop a close relationship. Where did this sudden attitude come from? "What on earth is going through your mind son? I love you." she said softly. She picked up his hand and held it.

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David walked in House's office and found House had already served himself and was eating, "Susan sent me down for dinner," he said. House gestured to the chair and David sat down. He picked up a plate and dished out some of the spaghetti. "What are you looking for in the chicken salad?"

"Not sure exactly, but we have to rule out everything. Tell me about his mother," House said.

"She was beautiful. We were married for three years when she got pregnant…." David started.

"I don't care about the wonderful life you had together. Tell me about her."

"What do you want to know?"

"Did she have any allergies? Did she have any weird birthmarks? Did she have any siblings?"

"No to the first two, she had a sister that died when she was young," David said.

"How'd she die?"

"Marie never really knew, she said she just got real sick and then a few days later she died," David's eyes grew wide, "Do you think Phillip has the same thing? Oh God, I can't lose him," David said fearfully.

"I don't know what your son has and I don't know what she had, so there isn't any way to know if they have the same thing," House said. "Pull yourself together and tell me everything you know." Other than a very few facts like how old she was when she died and that she was older than Marie, David really wasn't able to tell House anything about Marie's sister.

"She never said anything about things they did together or her habits?" House asked.

"Marie was only five when her sister died, so she didn't really remember very much," David explained.

Park walked in the office, "LP was clear, it's not meningitis," she said. "There's also no evidence of any drugs in his system, other than the Phenergan you gave him for his nausea."

"What's the CT show?" House asked.

"Adams is taking him down now," Park said. "We should have the results in a couple of hours."

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Adams came into Phillip's room with a couple of orderlies to transport him to the CT room. Susan watched them leave with Phillip and then got up and walked to House's office. David was alone, "Where's Greg?"

"He said he was going home," David answered.

"How was he getting there? Wilson brought him to the hospital," Susan said.

"And Wilson took him home."

"He can't do anything more until he has results, so he may as well get some rest," Susan said. "You need to rest too, let's go up to Phillip's room and you can crash out on the recliner there. That way if Phillip wakes up, you'll be there."

"What about you?" David asked.

"I'll be around," Susan said. "I'm not going home either."

Susan made her way to her office after she walked David to Phillip's room and pulled up the lab's work order for Phillip. Results were coming in as the techs were working their way through the tests. So far everything she was seeing was in normal range for an adolescent male. One of his liver enzymes was a little high, but it wasn't anything to worry about. Susan smiled to herself, that particular enzyme meant that Phillip was entering puberty. It wouldn't be long and he would shoot past her and be rivaling his dad in height. His jeans were already getting high water so when he got past this illness she would take him shopping for new jeans and shoes. Her phone beeped with a text, _Phillip's back in the room now._

She responded: _Try_ _to rest. I'm watching the lab results come in_.

_See anything unusual?_ He texted.

_Not yet. 3 U_

_U2_

Susan put the phone on her desk and moved the other chair closer so she could put her feet up and leaned back. She closed her eyes and tried to turn her brain off so she could rest while the rest of the results came in. It didn't work and she ended up watching the numbers populate the electronic report one at a time until each line was full.

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Susan opened the door to House's office and walked in; it was dark and quiet. She placed the lab results on his chair so he'd see them when he first walked in, not that it would do any good. Everything was normal and while that was good, it was also bad because it didn't help solve the puzzle. She'd gone by her old lab and looked at the cultures that Dr. Park had set up, nothing. She hadn't expected anything, but it didn't hurt to look. She glanced around the lab when she heard someone walk in. "What are you doing?" Dr. Foreman asked.

"You're here rather late tonight. I wanted to see the cultures from the chicken salad," she said. She went over to the chemistry analyzer and opened the lid. She could see that the monthly maintenance hadn't been done, so she started that while Dr. Foreman was standing there.

"I'm on my way out. You know that isn't your responsibility anymore. Dr. Park will take care of all that."

"So you're giving it back to him?" Susan said.

"Not really, it belongs to all the doctors who want to run their own tests, but House will choose to do that more often than the others. You know he doesn't trust the main lab."

"He trusts me," Susan said, "and now that includes the main lab. I bet he'll be using the main lab more often." She continued her work while he stood there. "Besides, just because I'm the lab director doesn't mean I can't get my hands wet from time to time."

"You're not going to be part of his team," Foreman said.

"Not officially," Susan said. "But if he needs me to run a test for him or present findings, I'm within my responsibilities as lab director to provide the support he needs to make a diagnosis. Like you said, we need him around here and I'm going to do everything I can to make him successful. If that means I run a few tests myself, then so be it."

Foreman smirked, "He's lucky to have you. Most wouldn't care."

"And most people don't know what they're missing. Despite what you and everybody else thinks, he's a good man. He just approaches life from a different angle." Susan shut the lid on the analyzer and washed her hands. She walked by the bench where she had put the lab results and walked out with Dr. Foreman following her.

In House's office she sat down in his Eams chair and thought about her conversation with Foreman. While he had told her that she would remain where she was as far as the hospital was concerned. He hadn't forbidden her from working with House either. Susan was glad about that as working with House forced her to use her brain much more than managing day to day operations of the main lab. She knew that she'd been directly responsible for helping House solve a number of cases in the past. If only she could help him solve Phillip's case. What were they missing? Susan said a silent prayer for guidance and healing and then dozed off.


	6. Chapter 6

CHAPTER SIX

Susan startled awake and realized Greg's orthopedic neighbors were arriving to work. She got up and looked through the door at them. They were pretty noisy and she could see where he would find them annoying while he was trying to think. Hopefully in the not distant future, they would find a new home elsewhere. Susan turned away from the door to orthopedics and left out the hallway door.

She poked her head in Phillip's room. Phillip was awake, "May I come in?" Phillip nodded his head and Susan came inside. "Where is your dad?" Phillip shrugged and looked away from Susan. Susan sat down in the recliner and waited in awkward silence for David to return. Fortunately she didn't have to wait long as David arrived within a couple of minutes looking clean and refreshed.

"Somebody's awake," he said. "How are you feeling?"

"I don't feel like I'm about to throw up, but I'm really tired," Phillip said.

"Well, that's something," David said. He looked over at Susan, "I'm glad you came in. I missed you last night. You look pretty beat up though."

"I was up most of the night," she said.

"Did you learn anything?" David asked.

"Only that Phillip has entered puberty," Susan said.

Phillip snapped his head around to Susan, "How do you know? Have you been spying on me?"

"Phillip, that's enough. Sick or not, you are not allowed to talk to her like that. Do you understand? You need to apologize to Susan," David demanded.

"Sorry," Phillip said although it was clear from his tone that he didn't mean it.

"Phillip," Susan said. "I have not been spying on you. I know you've entered puberty because of your blood work, not because I've been looking at you. Even when I helped you clean yourself up at home yesterday, I wasn't looking at you. I respect your privacy."

"_You_ didn't help me yesterday," Phillip said. "Dad was with me."

"No son, I didn't get there until later. Remember, Susan picked you up from school and brought you home," David said. Phillip looked confused. "You don't remember that?" Phillip shook his head. David and Susan looked at each other. Susan got up and walked out.

"Where's she going?" Phillip asked.

"To find and talk to Dr. House."

Ten minutes later Susan was back with Dr. Park. Phillip had fallen back asleep and David was standing next to his bed. "He's asleep?" Susan asked, "I wasn't gone that long."

Dr. Park moved to the side of the bed and started to examine him, "He's not asleep; he's unconscious. We need an EEG; I'll go talk to House." Dr. Park left the room.

Susan turned and looked at David, all the color had left his face and he looked like he was about to pass out. Susan went over to him and guided him to the chair. "Sit down David," she said.

"Susan," he said and wrapped his arms around her. "Please tell me he's going to be OK," he whispered. Susan didn't say anything, but held him close.

Park and Adams came back into the room with the EEG machine and started hooking it up to Phillip. House walked in the room and over to the EEG just as it started printing. He read the tape over Parks shoulder and then stepped back. Park continued looking at the pattern, "This wave pattern suggests a metabolic disorder," she said. "Except that we've already ran all the metabolic blood work and everything is normal."

"We've missed something," he said.

"Alk phos was high," Park said. "Maybe it's his liver."

"Seriously?" House said looking at her, "He's twelve; it's supposed to be high." Susan was staring out in space, "What are you thinking Susan?" House asked.

"Metabolic," Susan said. "I'm trying to think of everything we've eaten over the last week or so." She looked over at David, "No food allergies?"

"No," David said.

"What about things he doesn't like?" Susan asked.

"Well, these days he's eating nearly everything, but until recently I had to struggle to get him to eat his meat," David said. "If it was up to him, he'd eat bread and pasta all day and never touch a piece of meat."

"Ammonia," House and Susan said together. Susan jumped up and left the room and went to the lab.

"Start him on sodium phenylbuterate, citrulline and arginine," House said. Park and Adams left the room to get the medication and return the EEG machine.

"So that's it, you've solved it?" David asked.

"No, we're treating the symptoms. We still don't know the cause," House said.

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Back in the lab, Susan was rummaging through the refrigerator for the left over serum sample from Phillip's blood work, "Can I help you find something Susan?" Abby asked.

"I'm looking for the left over serum from Phillip James," Susan said. "It was just run last night, so it should be in here."

Abby looked in the computer and found the specimen number, "It should be in the white box on the top shelf."

Susan shifted up a shelf and starting going through the samples on that shelf. It wasn't long before she found the sample and handed it to Abby, "Run an ammonia test on this."

"Susan, you're not thinking clearly," Abby said. "This is serum and on top of that it's 12 hours old."

"Right, that was stupid," Susan agreed. She went into phlebotomy and asked Heather to run up to Phillip's room and pull a plasma tube for ammonia analysis. Heather took off with her phlebotomy tray and was back in the lab in fifteen minutes with the tube full of blood, "Ok, now run this for ammonia," she said to Abby handing it over.

"I need it added in the system, Susan. The LIS system won't allow me to test without the test added," Abby said.

"Right," Susan said. "I'm so tired my brain has turned to mush." Susan went to her computer in her office and pulled up the LIS system and added the test with House as the ordering physician. "Okay!" she hollered out to Abby, "it's there."

Abby had already moved to the analyzer and had started prepping the sample. She put the sample on, assigned it as a STAT so the instrument would move to it next before starting the next sample in the queue. It wasn't long before the instrument probe was pulling a sample from the specimen and beginning its analysis. Susan watched the results screen and as soon as the number showed up, she picked up her phone and called House. "Ammonia is 267"

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"Who was that?" asked David.

"Your wife," House said as he closed his phone, "confirming the high ammonia level."

"How long will this take?" David asked.

"He should come around in a couple of hours as his ammonia levels drop. They should be nearly normal by the end of the day. They won't stay down though, if we don't find the cause," House said. "Call me when he wakes up."

House walked out the door as Susan was coming in. He reached out to touch her arm and said something to her. Susan nodded with her reply and came into the room. David reached his arm out toward Susan and she came toward him. He pulled her to him and scooted as far to one side of the recliner as he could and pulled her down next to him then leaned the chair back. Susan rested her head on his shoulder and her arm over his chest. "House says he'll come around in a couple of hours as his ammonia levels drop," he said.

"Good," Susan replied.

"What did he say to you?"

"He said I looked like crap and needed to sleep," Susan said with a chuckle.

"Well, I think you look beautiful, but you _are_ obviously very tired," David confirmed.

"I didn't sleep much last night while I was waiting on results. Once they were finished, I did finally crash for a couple of hours in Greg's office before Orthopedics arrived in his old outer office. They're really loud; I'm surprised Greg hasn't sabotaged their equipment yet. It'd be next to impossible to think with all that noise."

David kissed her forehead and wrapped his arm around her, "Close your eyes and rest for a while. I'll watch Phillip." Susan did as she was told and within just a few minutes was sound asleep.

An hour later Phillip regained consciousness; he opened his eyes and looked around at all the equipment hooked up to him then glanced over at this dad and Susan. Susan was asleep curled up on her side with her head on his dad's shoulder. His dad's eyes were closed, but he didn't think he was asleep because his thumb was gently rubbing Susan's hand that was resting on his chest. Phillip didn't say anything, but continued to watch them. David opened his eyes and looked over at Phillip, "Good to see you awake. How are you feeling?"

"Better, I think. I guess she's really tired," Phillip said quietly as he watched Susan breathe.

"She was up all night waiting for your lab results," David answered.

Phillip was silent for a moment while he thought about what his dad said, "Why would she do that?"

"Because she cares about you son,"

"But I'm not really her kid," Phillip said. "I'm just her stepson."

"Not to her you're not; as far as she is concerned you are as much her son as Laura is her daughter," David explained. Phillip shook his head not understanding. Jerrod had told him that his stepmom wished he wasn't born and only treated him nice when his dad was around. So far Susan hadn't been like that, but Phillip knew it wouldn't be long before the same thing happened to him. Phillip turned his head toward the door as a nurse walked in the room to check his vitals. Addressing the nurse David said, "Dr. House said he wanted to be called when Phillip regained consciousness."

"I'll take care of that," the nurse said as she wrote down his vitals.

The nurse left the room and Phillip turned his head back toward his dad and looked again at Susan wondering if what his dad said was true. After a few moments he asked, "Were you as happy with mom as you are with Susan?"

"Phillip, I loved your mother very much and yes we were happy. I waited nine years before I allowed myself to move on and now that I have, I'm happier than I have been in a long time. What I had with your mother was special and I will always have a place in my heart for her, after all she gave me you. I will never forget her and what we shared, but she's gone now," David paused for a moment before he continued, "Phillip, you need to understand that there is nothing wrong with me sharing the rest of my life with somebody other than your mother. Just because I've chosen Susan to be my wife, doesn't mean I'm going to forget your mother. At the same time, what I have with Susan is unique and I love her more than I can even begin to explain to you."

"Do you love her more than mom?" Phillip asked.

"Love isn't quantifiable Phillip. I loved your mother very much and I love Susan very much, but the love that I felt for your mother is different than the love I feel for Susan," He kissed her forehead again, "I wouldn't want them to be the same."

"As touching as this all is, I need to talk to your son," House said as he breezed in from the hallway not at all concerned with being quiet. Susan opened her eyes and looked up at David, whispered in his ear and then together they worked themselves into a sitting position. House checked Phillip's pupil response as well as his proprioception on his left side, all of which had returned to normal. "Why don't you like meat?" House asked when he was finished.

"It's OK," Phillip said.

"Your dad said that you'd rather not eat it if you had a choice, and you only recently started eating it."

"Susan's a better cook than dad," Phillip said, then looked over at David. "Sorry dad."

"No problem," David said grinning. "I agree."

"You ever feel sick after you eat?" House asked.

"Well, just after that sandwich the other day," Phillip said. "I don't think I want chicken salad anymore."

"Understandable," Susan said, "but that isn't what made you sick."

"There are only a few conditions that build up ammonia in your system. It shouldn't take long to narrow them down. In the meantime, we're going to keep you on the medication and watch your ammonia levels. Until we know the cause, I'm going to order that the cafeteria only give you vegetarian meals," House said.

"I don't like vegetables," Phillip said.

"It's that or starve," House said, "your choice." He looked over at Susan, "follow me."

Susan got up. "I'll be back," she told David and followed House out the door.

"I need more information about Phillip's mother and her family," House said.

"Like what?" Susan asked.

"Medical history, lifestyle, gossip, whatever you can get," he answered. In the meantime, I need to order some genetic tests," he said. House explained which genetic tests he needed and Susan went to the lab to get the supplies she needed for the tests he requested.

Susan walked in the lab and over to phlebotomy to get what she needed for the tests that House wanted to run, "Heather would you pack me a phlebotomy kit and supply it with yellow top tubes and also buckle cell swabs for DNA analysis?"

"Sure Susan," Heather said and started putting what Susan needed together.

Susan went over to the supply closet to get a box of gloves in her size and when she got there she found that all the medium size latex gloves were missing. _Really?_ She said to herself. Susan looked down at the bottom shelf to where the nitrile gloves were stored and grabbed a box of mediums. She went back into phlebotomy to get her tray from Heather.

"I thought we weren't supposed to use the nitrile gloves unless we had a latex allergy," Heather said.

"I'd rather you didn't, they are quite expensive, but it seems we're out of medium gloves," Susan said.

"There was an entire case in there this morning," Heather replied.

"There isn't now, I want you and the others to keep an eye on the supply room. I need to know who is taking off with our supplies. Our budget is too tight to be supplying the entire hospital," Susan said. "I'm going to go collect these samples."

Several minutes later Susan walked into Phillip's room bearing the phlebotomy tray and headed over to the bed. David was sitting in the chair next to Phillip's bed reading a journal and Phillip was flipping through the channels on the television. David looked up when Susan walked in and smiled, "You're back."

"I'm never far," Susan said. "Hey kiddo, we need to get some samples from you to do more testing."

Phillip was staring at the tray of syringes, needles and tubes. His eyes opened wide, "Those are really big syringes," he said.

"Oh these?" Susan held up the largest syringe in the tray and tossed him the package. Phillip picked it up and looked at it his eyes growing even larger when he saw the two inch needle. Susan grinned at him and then let him off the hook, "We're not using that syringe on you – it's just part of the normal supplies in the tray." Phillip's face quickly shifted from apprehension to relief and David laughed.

"You're mean," David said.

"It's all part of being the 'evil step-mother'," Susan teased. "Seriously though, Phillip, we need a couple of samples." She pulled out the buckle cell kit and showed him how the swab would rub on the inside of his cheek. She put on a pair of gloves and opened the kit, "Here, you can even do it yourself."

Phillip rubbed the swab on the inside of his cheek just as Susan told him to and then handed it back. Susan slipped the swab inside the container and labeled it. Then she pulled out a tourniquet, three yellow top tubes and a needle, "I'm afraid you can't do this one yourself," she said. "However, if you want someone else to take your blood, I understand."

"You can do it," Phillip said trying to be brave.

"Ok. Now I'm going to give you the tubes for you to hold in your other hand after I put your blood in them. I want you to mix them up real good, but don't shake them. Just turn them upside down and right side up seven times, like this." Susan explained showing him how to invert the tubes. She cleaned the inside of his arm with alcohol and then put the tourniquet over his bicep. "You know when you get well, I think we should go shopping. You're outgrowing your clothes and you've got holes in the knees in some of your jeans," Susan said to distract him as she plunged the needle in his arm and starting pulling the first tube. "And, I think you need some new sneakers too, don't you?" Phillip nodded but was looking away from his arm. Soon Susan had all three tubes pulled and she handed them to Phillip, "Start mixing those just like I showed you," she said.

"You're already finished?" Phillip asked. "I didn't even feel it."

"Good," Susan said with a smile. She finished putting the co-band around his arm to lessen any chance of a bruise and then took the tubes from him. "Nice and mixed up, good job," she said.

"Jerrod said you wouldn't like the way I dress," Phillip said referring back to what she said earlier. "He said you would start telling me what to wear." David looked up from his journal.

"Why would he tell you that?" David asked.

"He said his step mother hates him and is always telling him what to do and what to wear."

Susan decided to step back from the conversation and let David take lead, "Son, Jerrod has been through a lot with his mother. She didn't take care of him and didn't give him any direction at all. His step mother has had to take over the role his real mother didn't provide."

"He said that he is going back to live with his real mom this summer," Phillip said. "He said that she was really cool and let him do whatever he wanted. He said since he was thirteen the judge will let him do what he wants."

"No Phillip; the judge isn't going to let Jerrod go live with his mom," David said.

"But Jerrod said…," Phillip started.

"Jerrod doesn't know the whole story," David explained. "I can guarantee you that he won't be living with his mom. His stepmom is a wonderful lady and she's already worked wonders with Jerrod. He's much better off with her and his dad than he is with his mother."

Susan remembered Jerrod from when he spent the night with Phillip several weeks ago when his parents had to go out of town overnight, but was unaware of the story behind his situation. She looked over at David as she followed the conversation. Finally, she decided to speak up, "Phillip, I don't know what Jerrod has told you, but just because he thinks his relationship with his stepmom is bad, doesn't mean that our relationship will be the same way. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if his relationship with his stepmom is a lot better than he is letting on. Maybe listening to Jerrod isn't the best way to learn about what a step mother will do or not do."

"So you're saying I shouldn't be friends with Jerrod. He said you'd say that too," Phillip said.

"No, you're putting words in my mouth. I'm not saying that at all," Susan said.

"What she's saying, Phillip, is you need to make your own judgment based on your own experience. Don't rely on other people to tell you how things are or will be," David said. "You can and should listen to other people and learn from their experience, but you always need to think for yourself."

"I'm going to run these down to the lab. We have to send them out and I want to get them in today's shipment," Susan said.

Phillip didn't say anymore after Susan left. He picked up the remote and started flipping through the channels. David could see that he wasn't really paying attention to the channels, just flipping through them, "What are you thinking son?"

"Nothing."

Obviously Phillip wasn't thinking about nothing, but David decided not to press him. He knew that Phillip was thinking over everything that he'd been told and that he'd come to his own conclusions soon. The television finally landed on a channel and stayed there for more than just a few seconds. David glanced up; it was some show about catching alligators in the swamp. He watched for a moment and then took up his journal to finish the article he's been reading.

"Dad?"

David looked up in question, "Do you think Jerrod will ever like his stepmom?"

"I'm sure one of these days he'll realize how blessed he is to have her," David said letting that sink in and hoping Phillip would apply it to himself.

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan sent the samples off to the reference lab and indicated the results to be rushed. They'd have to pay extra for that, but it was worth it to Susan to get the results back quicker. She went in her office and sat down to rest for a minute. She was so tired.

"You know an hour here and an hour there isn't going to get you what you need," House said as he came in the door.

"I know," she said. "When this is over, I'm going to crash."

"You need to take better care of yourself," he said.

"Interesting," Susan said. "Why would you say that?"

"I can't care about the well-being of my sister?" he asked.

Susan laughed, "Right."

"You laugh. I'm hurt," House said and then came in and sat down. "Did you get those samples sent off?"

"Yep," Susan said. "Put a rush on them, so hopefully we'll have the results in a couple of days. In the meantime, what do we do?"

"We treat the symptoms. His ammonia levels are dropping precipitously. There are least three different metabolic causes for high ammonia levels, but they're all treated similarly," House said.

"He's going to have to go on a vegetarian diet," Susan said.

"Yes, which means you'll be making major changes in the way you cook," House said.

"Yeah, I tend to center our meals on what variety of meat I'm cooking for that meal. Jeff was a real carnivore and I got used to cooking meat-centric," she said. "It's definitely going to be a change of pace." She paused for a moment thinking, "Well, I'm always up for a challenge. I'm sure I'll enjoy experimenting. In fact, there are a lot of vegetarian cook books in one of the cabinets in the kitchen," Susan said.

"David's wife was a vegetarian?" House asked.

"Apparently," Susan said. House's eyes took on a faraway look, "I know that look," Susan said. House didn't reply and turned to walk out the door.

"Why didn't you tell me your wife was a vegetarian?" House asked David when he walked in the room.

"I..uh..," David said.

"Forget it, _why_ was she a vegetarian?" he asked. "Was it a religious thing or some great calling to save all the animals in the world…?"

"No, not really; she didn't have any issues cooking meat for me, she just said it gave her a headache every time she ate it, so she just didn't eat it to avoid the headache," David said.

"Now see, everybody lies. That's the kind of information I needed. You're right kid, your mom did make you sick," House said. Susan finally walked in just as House made that comment.

"I did _not_ make him sick," Susan said.

"I'm not talking about you; I'm talking about his real mom. Although you didn't help matters any," House said. "You have partial OTC syndrome and you inherited it from your mother."

"I thought OTC syndrome showed itself during infancy," Susan said.

"Not always, this is the later variety and not anywhere near as severe. If it had been the full version, he would have died before he even reached one year old. It's a lot worse in males than in females. We treat for the ammonia levels and you'll have to be counseled by a dietician. Great! Case closed, Later." House walked out the door leaving the rest of the family behind rather stunned by the outcome.

"So I'm going to be OK?" Phillip asked.

"You're going to be fine," Susan said. "You're going to have to deal with getting your blood taken a lot so we can monitor your ammonia levels and we'll adjust your eating habits, but yes, you're going to be fine."

David smiled, "Thank God."

Susan smirked, "Yes, but don't let Greg hear you. He likes to take full credit."


	7. Chapter 7

CHAPTER SEVEN:

Susan left David and Phillip and went back to her office. She was behind in her administration duties and decided to leave the boys to themselves while she got caught up, providing she didn't fall asleep at her desk. _This is ridiculous_, she thought to herself. _I've gone 36 hours with no sleep and have done better than this. At least I've managed to get an hour here and there. I just shouldn't be this tired._ Susan put her thoughts aside and pulled up her email.

An hour later and she was being shook awake. Susan lifted her head off of her desk to see David looking down at her, "OK, that's enough. I'm taking you home," he said. "You're worn out."

"No, I'm alright. I've gotten as much sleep as you," Susan said.

"No, I've gotten more sitting in that chair while Phillip was sleeping. But that's irrelevant, I'm taking you home."

"What about Phillip?" Susan asked.

"He'll be fine for the short time that I'm gone. Come on we're leaving," David said. He pulled her up and grabbed her bag and led her out the door.

"Why did you come down to the lab?" Susan asked when they got down to the car.

"House dropped by and asked if you'd gone home to rest," David replied. "Then when I told him you went to your office, he seemed perturbed that you hadn't gone home."

"Perturbed?" Susan asked.

"He said you needed to start taking better care of yourself and then he walked out the door," David explained. "I asked Phillip if he was going to be OK for a while and he said he was fine. So I came to check on you and found you asleep at your desk. I'm taking you home and while I'm there I'm going to take a shower and pick up Phillip's homework and take it back with me. _You_ are going to sleep and I don't want to see you at the hospital again until tomorrow morning."

Susan was rather taken aback at David's authoritative tone. She hadn't heard anyone speak to her that way since Jeff and it rubbed her the wrong way. Instead of confronting David, she fell back into her old habit of shutting down and not saying anything. It was always better that way with Jeff. If she got defensive, it was always worse than if she just let him say what he needed to say. She looked out the window and kept her mouth shut. She tried to keep the emotion at bay, but she was so tired that she was quickly failing.

About half way home David realized something was wrong. "Susan?" Susan didn't respond and kept looking out the window. "Susan, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," she replied keeping her eyes averted.

"Susan, talk to me," David said. Susan stayed silent and when David pulled into the driveway, she got out of the car without saying a word and went into the house. Once inside she went to their room, pulled off her shoes and laid down facing away from the door. David walked in the room and sat down next to Susan on the bed, "Susan, please."

David heard her sniff. He put his hand on her shoulder and pulled her onto her back. Susan resisted and pulled away, "I'm doing what you said! OK?" she said, "Just leave me alone and let me sleep."

"Doing what I said?" David repeated. "What are you talking about?" Then it hit him what she meant. "Oh. Susan I didn't mean it that way; I wasn't trying to tell you what to do."

"Sure sounded that way," Susan said. "I think I'm capable of taking care of myself. I don't need you telling me when to go to bed or when I should get up and that you expect me to behave in a certain way. I'm not your child. I had enough of that before, I don't need it now."

David got up and walked around to the other side of the bed and lay down next to Susan so he could face her. He situated himself closer to her and put his arm around her, "Susan, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to come across that way. You're just so tired and I was worried about you. I want you to rest, but you're right, I had no business talking to you like that. Please forgive me."

"I guess I'm a little touchy; I _am_ tired," Susan said. "It wasn't as much what you said as the way you said it. It just rubbed me the wrong way and brought back feelings that I'd rather keep in the past."

David pulled her close and held her, kissing her lightly, "I love you. I know you went through a lot emotionally with Jeff. I don't want to be that way; I never want to hurt you."

"It's okay," Susan said quietly. David continued to hold her, gently rubbing her back until he felt her breath even out as she fell into slumber. He continued to lie beside her until he knew she was completely asleep and then quietly got up to take his shower and get Phillip's things.

MDMDMDMD

House walked in to Phillip's room and looked around, "Where's your dad?"

"He went to check on Susan," Phillip said, "but he's been gone for a while."

House went over to the bed, checked a few vitals and made some notations on Phillip's chart. Once that was finished he moved around to the head and pulled a game system out of his pocket and handed it over, "I want it back," he said.

"Cool!" Phillip said, "Thanks." He turned it on and started the game.

"What's between you and Susan?" House asked once Phillip was engrossed in the game.

"Nothing, she's my stepmom that's all," Phillip said as he tried to maneuver his guy around some rocks without getting shot by the opponent.

"That's all," House repeated.

"Yeah, that's all. It's not like she's my mom," he said as shot a bad guy, "Got him!"

"And that matters because?" House asked.

"Moms are cool. Stepmom's are just there because the dad wants them around. They don't care about you," Phillip said sending his guy around another corner and barely avoiding getting his head blown off.

"Interesting," House said. "What's your evidence?"

"My mom was awesome; she took good care of me," Phillip said.

"Unlikely," House said. Phillip looked up from his game at House causing him to lose his guy.

"You take that back! You don't know!" Phillip said.

"Your mom was sick and dying from the time you were born. She could barely hold you much less feed you, change your diapers or clean up your puke. You don't know what she did or didn't do for you because you don't remember," House said. He took his game away from Phillip and walked out.

"That's not true!" Phillip yelled behind him.

Phillip sat back in his bed and thought about what House said. By the time David returned from home, it was readily apparent that Phillip had been crying, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Phillip said.

"What is it today? Between you and Susan I'm getting a lot of 'Nothing's' when _something_ is clearly wrong. Why were you crying?" David asked.

"I told him the truth," House said from behind.

David turned around, "Explain."

"He's your kid; let him explain it to you. In the meantime, Susan doesn't need to deal with this right now," House said.

At this point David was beginning to think that everybody was talking in circles around him, "What's wrong with Susan? That's the second time you've alluded that there might be a problem with her."

"Nothing is wrong with her, but she sure doesn't need the added stress your kid is putting on her right now. You have a problem," he said pointing to Phillip, "and you need to deal with it." House walked out of the room and went to his office. He sat in his chair and pulled up his pant leg to scratch his leg around the monitor strap. House turned his attention to his computer and started browsing Medline for relevant articles and soon was lost in his reading.

MDMDMDMDMD

"You want to tell me what that was all about?" David asked his son as he put Phillip's backpack on the bed next to him. Phillip shook his head, "Ok let me rephrase that; tell me what that was all about. It's not a request."

"House said I couldn't remember mom," Phillip said.

"OK, I think we both already knew that. Why does that upset you?" David asked.

"He said she didn't take good care of me," Phillip said.

"Well son, House doesn't always phrase things as gently as he should, but he has a point," David said. "Phillip, your mother was very sick. She did the best she could, but an infant takes a lot of work and by the time you were six months old, her cancer started spreading and the chemotherapy she was on made her very ill. That doesn't mean she didn't love you, but she couldn't really take care of you. She had to have a lot of help," David explained. "I still don't understand why this upset you."

"It wasn't a very nice thing to say," Phillip said.

"No son, it wasn't," David agreed. David knew that wasn't the whole story. Susan believed that House never did or said anything without purpose so there had to be more than Phillip was letting on. David also knew that the only person House was even remotely protective over was Susan; he'd seen that over and over again so House had to feel that whatever Phillip was dealing with was going to adversely affect Susan. David decided to go talk to House, "Phillip I need to step out for a minute, will you be OK?" Phillip nodded and started flipping through the channels on the television.

MDMDMDMDMd

House looked up as David came in the door and sat down in front of the desk, "That was a little harsh don't you think?"

House shrugged, "It was the truth."

"Sure, but you didn't need to say it that way. He's just twelve."

"The world isn't nice and cuddly, sometimes the truth hurts," House said.

"Also true, but family _shouldn't_ be the one to bring the pain, at least not on purpose," David replied.

"It shouldn't, no; but usually family causes the most. Look David, I'm obviously not his family. If he can't accept Susan as his mother; do you really think he's going to accept me as his uncle? Susan and I are biologically tied, but we weren't raised together. Technically, the 'family' part of the deal is tenuous at best."

"What's wrong with Susan?" David asked changing the course of the conversation trying to get answers to his other concern.

"Nothing is wrong with Susan. She's perfectly healthy," House replied.

"Then why are you worried about her?" David asked.

House looked at David, "I'm not worried."

"Bull," David said. "Susan is the only person you are protective with and you've said several times now that she doesn't need to deal with this or that she needs to rest. I want to know what is wrong with her."

"Nothing is wrong with her David; she just needs rest and a little less stress. Go take care of your son," House said. David didn't get up and stared at House. "That was your cue to leave," House said as he gestured to the door. David eyed him, but got up and walked out without saying anything else.

David walked in the elevator and punched the button to the pediatrics floor. The conversations between him and Phillip and then with House meandering through his brain; he knew Phillip was having issues with Susan, but he didn't know why. It was obvious that Phillip had been listening to Jerrod about stepmoms, but Jerrod had problems of his own that he was sounding out about. Phillip had finally accepted that Susan had not poisoned him, but he was still struggling with the fact that she actually cared about him. That totally blew his mind as it was obvious that Susan cared very deeply for his son. Lately Phillip had been worried a lot about the relationship or the lack thereof he had with his mom. There was no way that Phillip would remember anything about Marie, but he liked pretending that he did. Snippets of past conversations about Susan came back to David, _"I wish you wouldn't call her mom, she's my stepmom at most. Why does she care? She's just my stepmom. Stepmoms just want the kid out of the way; Dad, I think Susan made me sick."_ This almost seemed like brainwashing. David shook his head, it's not brainwashing. It's a confused kid that wants a mom, but is afraid to reach out, afraid of being rejected. Jerrod had certainly done a number on Phillip with all his talk about his real mom and his stepmom. It was time to talk to Jerrod's dad. David pulled out his phone, "Craig, this is David…."


	8. Chapter 8

CHAPTER EIGHT:

Susan woke up and looked around her. She glanced at the clock; 10:23am. _Wow, I was really sleepy_, she observed to herself. She was still in the same clothes she'd worn for the last several days so she changed out of them and went to the shower. Feeling much better, she got dressed and headed down to the kitchen. She hadn't been shopping and at this point didn't trust the left-overs, so she put some bread in the toaster and pulled out the peanut butter. She smiled to herself, a meal Greg would be proud of; bread and peanut butter. As she ate her toast, she opened the cabinet above the oven and looked at the row of cookbooks. As she read the titles, she noticed that some of them were worn so must have been used quite a bit. Susan opened the kitchen closet and pulled out her step stool so she could reach the cookbooks. She grabbed two of the most worn looking cookbooks and took them over to the table and sat down to start going through them. Her phone rang, "This is Susan," she said.

"Are you feeling better?" It was Foreman.

"Yes, thank you,"

"After you come in and check on your family, would you mind stopping by my office?" he asked.

"Sure, is something wrong?" she asked.

"We're having supply issues," he said. "I need to get a handle on everything."

"Mine are being stolen," Susan said. "It'll probably be a couple of hours before I make it by."

"Not a problem," Foreman said and hung up.

Susan gathered her things and picked up the most worn cookbook and headed to the hospital.

MDMDMDMD

House was walking out of an exam room when he saw Susan enter the hospital. He handed the chart to the nurse and walked out of the clinic. He caught up to her at the elevator and stepped inside giving her an evaluating look, "Better" he said.

"I'm glad you approve," Susan said.

"Vegetarian cookbook," House noted the book Susan was carrying.

"It's one of those I was telling you about. This one is worn out the most, so I'm guessing Marie's favorite recipes were in this one," Susan said. "I thought Phillip and I could look through it together for something he might like to try."

"Why do you try so hard?" House said.

"He's my son," Susan replied.

"Not according to him," House said.

"He'll come around," Susan said noting the look on House's face as she said it. "Greg, he's just a kid. To his memory, he's spent his entire life living alone with his dad. Now I've come along and invaded his space. He's not sure where I fit in with him and all he has to go by is what his friends at school are telling him about mothers and stepmothers and unfortunately a good part of that information has been unreliable. He will come around. I know he will. I just have to give him time to work it out."

Susan got off on the pediatrics floor and the door closed behind her; House staying behind. She walked down the hall and into Phillip's room. David got up and came to her when he saw her walk in. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her, "It's good to see you," he said. "You look rested."

"I'm still sleepy, but I've slept long enough," she said.

"Would you mind sitting in here with Phillip while I go grab a bite to eat?" David asked with his arms still wrapped around her.

"Not at all," Susan said. She looked at Phillip, "I've got something for you." David left and Susan went over to Phillip's bedside. "Do you mind if I put the rail down and sit next to you?"

Phillip shook his head, "What do you have?"

"A book," Susan said.

"I'm not a baby, you don't need to read to me," Phillip said.

"It's not that kind of a book," she said as she boosted herself up on his bed. Phillip scooted over so she would have more room. She grabbed the cookbook she had set on the side table before she lowered the bed rail and showed it to Phillip. "It's one of your mother's vegetarian cookbooks. This one was the most worn, so I bet her favorite recipes are in here." Susan opened the book and started thumbing through the pages. It wasn't long before she came to a page that had been dog eared and was covered with splatter stains. "Phillip, I bet this was one of your mom's favorite recipes. See how the page has been marked and it has splatters all over it?" Phillip nodded. "I bet she made this dish over and over again. When Greg releases you from the hospital, we should make this dish together. Would you like that?" Phillip was quiet. "Are you feeling ok?"

"I'm fine," he said. He pulled the cookbook closer so he could look at the recipe. "Do you think it's any good?"

"I have no idea, but she must have liked it or the page wouldn't look like it does," Susan answered.

Phillip set the book down on his lap, "Why are you being so nice to me?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" asked Susan.

"I haven't been very nice to you."

"No, you haven't," Susan said. "You've been pretty rude at times lately. I really don't understand that, especially when I thought we got along so well before."

"I didn't think you really wanted to be my mom; Jerrod's stepmom doesn't," Phillip said.

"From what your Dad says, Jerrod's stepmom isn't nearly as bad as Jerrod wants you to believe," Susan said. "Phillip, I know what it is to lose your mom, I lost mine too. I miss her terribly, but she's gone and I have to move on. I want to do that with you and your father. You two are a matched set and I love both of you. I think you and I can be the best of friends if you'll just let me."

Tears started falling down Phillip's face and after a moment he said, "I don't want you to be my friend."

"Ok, you don't want me to be your stepmom and you don't want me to be your friend, what _do_ you want Phillip?" Susan said.

He sniffed and said so quietly it was almost a whisper, "I want you to be my mom."

Susan wrapped her arms around Phillip and drew him closer into a hug, "Phillip, I would be honored to be your mom," she answered with her own tears filling her eyes.

Soon Phillip's tears turned to the heavy sobs so familiar to all parents of young children. Susan held him close and rubbed his back, "I'm sorry," he said between tears and the hiccups his crying caused.

"It's ok," Susan said continuing to hold him, "Everything is going to be ok."

MDMDMDMDMD

House and Wilson stood outside Phillip's room watching the scene unfold in front of them, "That's sweet," Wilson said.

"Yeah, touching," House said with sarcasm though secretly he was pleased. This would make things much easier for Susan. "Feeling all warm and fuzzy on the inside are you?"

Wilson gave half a smile, "Your family is growing House and you didn't have anything to do with it."

House nodded, "It seems that way," he paused. "And in probably another 36 weeks or so, it'll grow by another 20%," House said.

Wilson's eyes went wide, "Susan's pregnant? When did she tell you?"

"She doesn't know," House answered.

"Then how do you…? Never mind," Wilson said. "Why doesn't Susan know?" he asked confused, "She's nearly as good as you picking up symptoms."

"She's been distracted lately, and also at her age, she's thinking menopause, not mini-people."

"Are you going to tell her?"

"Nah, she'll figure it out," House said. The two men moved off toward the elevator.

"It's risky at her age," Wilson said.

"It's always risky, but yeah it's not going to be easy on her."

"That's why you forced Phillip to acknowledge the truth, so that Susan would have one less stress in her life," Wilson said. "House, you're getting soft."

"Bite your tongue."

Wilson smiled, "Can't fool me. Hungry?" Wilson asked.

"Always," House answered.


	9. Chapter 9

CHAPTER NINE:

David arrived back in Phillip's room to see Susan and Phillip thoroughly engrossed in a cookbook, "What is Orza?" Phillip was asking Susan.

"It's a type of pasta that looks a little bit like rice," Susan explained. "This one looks like it would taste good," she said pointing to the picture next to the recipe.

"It doesn't look like my mother ever made it though," Phillip observed.

"No, but that doesn't mean we can't try it." Susan looked up, "Oh hi David, would you hand me my purse?"

David picked up her purse off of the visitors chair and handed it over, "What are you guys doing?" he asked.

"We're looking through this old cookbook of Marie's to find some good vegetarian dishes. Phillip and I are going to learn to cook vegetarian together," Susan said as she opened her purse and fished for a pen and some scrap paper. She wrote down the ingredients, "I'm going to have to stop by the grocery store tonight and pick up these ingredients."

"You're not going to stay with me tonight?" Phillip asked.

Susan smiled, "If you'd like me to, I will. We'll send your dad to the store instead and he could use a night in a real bed."

The look of relief on David's face over what he was seeing between his wife and his son was palpable, but he didn't say anything. Instead he looked over Susan's shoulder at the recipe book as she finished writing down the ingredients. Phillip turned the page to the next recipe. "I remember this one," he said pointing to the photo of a dish on a well spattered page. "It's really good."

Susan picked up her pen and wrote down the ingredients for that dish as well. When she was done, she wrote down a few other items and handed the list to David, "This is your task for this evening, and then _you_ go home and get some decent sleep. I'm staying here tonight. For now though, I promised Dr. Foreman that I would visit him."

Susan worked herself off the hospital bed and started out the door when David stopped her, "I'll walk you to the elevator; I'll be right back Phillip." Phillip nodded his head and turned his attention back to the cookbook. "Not that I'm not tickled pink, but what happened between you two?" David asked when they were far enough away from the room that Phillip wouldn't hear them.

"I honestly don't know, I think that he just finally realized the truth that I really do care about him," Susan said. "I think we probably need to talk to Jerrod's parents."

"I spoke with Craig last night and told him what was going on. He said they've had issues with Jerrod's mother recently and this is bringing out a lot of animosity in Jerrod. They've set up some counseling sessions for him that will hopefully help him work through his issues."

"I still think it would be a good idea for Phillip to talk to somebody too," Susan said. "I can't tell you how happy I am to have this breakthrough, but it probably wouldn't hurt for him to talk things out with somebody outside of the family." Susan yawned, "Oh, I'm Sorry; I guess I'm still a little sleepy."

"Maybe you should go home tonight instead of me," David said gently caressing her face as they waited for the elevator.

"No, he's asked me to stay and it won't hurt me to sleep in the recliner for one night. You need to stretch out and get some real rest yourself." The elevator door opened and Susan stepped inside. "I'll be back in a little while."

MDMDMDMDMD

Foreman lifted his eyes from the paperwork in front of him when he heard the knock on the door, "Come in."

"You asked me to drop by after I saw my family," Susan reminded him.

"Yes, please come in." Susan sat down in one of the chairs in front of his desk. "You mentioned that you've had some supplies stolen when we talked this morning."

"Gloves, first the larges and then the mediums; I had two cases of larges Tuesday morning and by the afternoon, they were gone. Yesterday, I went into the supply closet to grab a box of medium latex gloves and there wasn't any left. I know I had a full case that morning. I've asked the techs to keep an eye on who is going in and out of the closet."

"Cardiology is missing syringes, Obstetrics is missing absorbent pads, Oncology is missing normal saline IV bags, Orthopedics is missing gauze: I haven't heard from pediatrics, neurology, or urology yet." Foreman said.

"Any ideas on who could be behind it?" Susan asked.

"Do you really have to ask?" Foreman asked.

"No," Susan said knowing what he was thinking. "Greg wouldn't steal supplies."

"He would if it served him to do it," Foreman said.

"And that is exactly why he wouldn't steal them. It would serve him no purpose. Greg has no desire to go back to prison, he wouldn't do anything as blatantly obvious as stealing," Susan said. "I think you need to look outside the hospital."

"I've seen him steal, lie, cheat…"

"And think about what he was doing at the time," Susan said. "Greg has no problem stealing, lying, and cheating when it benefits his patient. He'll do whatever it takes for a diagnosis, including putting his own life at risk, but he doesn't do anything without purpose," Susan said. "You should know that. Any other time, he's specifically messing with Wilson or someone on his team."

"Or former team," Foreman said.

"Or former team," Susan acknowledged. "But I still don't think it's him. There's no doubt he's going to mess with you, but its not going to be by stealing hospital supplies. In the meantime, I'd like to make a suggestion."

"What's that?"

"Install card readers on the supply closets. Everybody has to wear their badges anyway to get in and out of certain areas of the hospital, so everybody that belongs here can get into the closets, and you can code them by department, so that folks that need to borrow from another department will have to have someone in that department help them. I know it seems a bit harsh as we've always had an open system around here, but until we solve this particular mystery, it might not be a bad idea."

Foreman nodded, "I agree, I'll get that in place."

"Is there anything else?" Susan asked.

"Go back to your family. Do you think you'll be back to work fulltime on Monday?"

"If Dr. House releases Phillip over the weekend, then yes," Susan said. "I'll work from home otherwise and I'll be ready for the department head meeting next week."

"Good," Foreman said ending the conversation.

MDMDMDMDMDMD

Susan made her way downstairs to the lab. Afternoon shift had arrived and Jason was prepping specimens for analysis, "Jason, do you know if the lab reports have arrived for Dr. House's patient?"

"Yes, they're over there," he said indicating the basket by the fax machine. "They came in about an hour ago."

"Have you entered the results into the system?"

"No," Jason said.

"Why not?" Susan asked.

"It's House's patient."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Susan asked. "Have you entered all other reference results that have come in?" Susan asked.

"Yes."

"Then why didn't you enter House's patient?" Susan asked.

"I don't work for Dr. House," Jason said.

"This lab services all the doctors in the hospital," Susan said, "that includes Dr. House."

"Well, I don't," Jason said. "I don't want to have anything to do with him."

Susan knew she needed to take care of this issue right away. She couldn't have her lab techs choosing who and who not to work with and Jason was a bright young man. He could go far, but he had to get past his fear of conflict, "Jason, go to my office and have a seat. I'll be there in just a minute." Susan went over to the basket next to the fax machine and pulled out Phillip's report. As Greg had diagnosed, Phillip had partial OTC syndrome. She took the report into her office and sat at her desk across from Jason. "Jason, I don't know what run-ins you've had with Dr. House in the past, but whatever it was, it's irrelevant. He's a doctor in this hospital and we have to provide results for his patients when they arrive."

"The man makes me nervous," Jason said. "I've seen the way he treats people and I don't want to deal with him. Nobody does."

"Let me tell you something about Dr. House. First of all, he just barks which means he may yell, insult or generally be demeaning to you, but it's all verbal. Secondly, he respects strength of character. If you are right and you know you are right, stand your ground. You'll find he'll be more accepting of your opinions and will turn to you more often to help him get through a diagnosis. Now, I want you to take these reports, put the results in the system and then physically take them to Dr. House." Jason swallowed with nervousness, but took the reports from Susan. He walked out the door with the reports.

MDMDMDMD

"Dr. House?" Jason said when he opened the door to House's office.

House looked up over his glasses from the journal he was reading. Jason stood in the door not moving. "Are you waiting for an invitation?" House asked the obviously terrified kid.

Jason walked in and took the report to him holding it out at arms length. House reached out to take the reports and glanced at them, "Why did you bring me these? We have a computer system to enter results."

"Susan told me to bring them to you personally," Jason answered.

House gave Jason an appraising look, "Where'd you go to school?"

"Here," Jason said.

"MT?"

"Yes and Chemistry; double major," Jason said.

"Med School?" House asked. Jason shrugged.

"Hmmph," House uttered. "Only morons don't know what they want. Figure it out." Jason continued to stand there, "Do I have to tell you when to leave? Maybe you're more of a moron than I thought."

Jason walked out the door and went back to the lab wondering what the point of that was, but Susan was right, it was just barking or maybe in this case just a growl. He could handle that if he needed to.

House watched Jason leave and head down the hall. _ Interesting_, he thought to himself and went back to his reading.

Ten minutes later Susan walked in his office and sat down in front of his desk, "Did Jason bring by the reports?"

House picked them up for her to see, "Rather pointless exercise since the results were already posted in the computer system."

"Not pointless," Susan said. "Jason's bright and he has a lot of potential. He's going to be the one to do most of the testing for your patients. I wanted you to meet him."

"I saw him in your office the other day when he was complaining about the gloves," House replied.

"Seeing and meeting are two different things."

"Don't need anybody else doing my testing while you're around," House said.

"Well, I'm not always going to be able to stop what I'm doing and test your samples _and_ Jason needs the experience. Don't worry, I'll be looking over his shoulder and I'm always there to help," Susan said.

House couldn't argue knowing that it was a losing battle. He'd settle for her close supervision of the tech. Switching gears, he looked closely at Susan noting her face was a little redder than normal which he knew was a side effect of her medication. She hadn't put on her make-up this morning to cover the rosacea in her face, "What do you take for your hypertension?"

Susan was a bit surprised by the change in topic, "Lisinopril and HCTZ; why?"

House pulled out his prescription pad, "I'm taking you off the Lisinopril," he said as he wrote out a prescription.

"Why? I'm very well controlled. I check my blood pressure on a regular basis to make sure," Susan said. "Besides, it's cheap."

House finished writing the script and handed it over to Susan, "Switch to this one," he said. "It's safer." Susan looked puzzled as she took the prescription from him. "Monitor your blood pressure every day and give me the readings at the end of next week. If we need to make any adjustments, we will. How are you feeling in general?"

"How am I feeling?" Susan was thoroughly confused by this line of conversation, "I'm fine."

"You're not nauseous or tired?" House asked.

"Well, I am tired, but it's been a crazy…." Susan trailed off as the wheels started turning in her head. "Lisinopril is a category D pharmaceutical….You think I'm pregnant!"

"I don't think; I know," he replied. "The real question is why you don't?"

"No reason to," Susan said still stunned by the revelation. "My cycle has been very irregular for the last six months and hot flashes are increasing in number and intensity; I've started menopause."

"No morning sickness?" House asked.

"No, but I wouldn't expect it. I never had morning sickness with Laura." Susan leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes. She opened her eyes and House saw fear behind the intense blue, "I'm too old Greg," she nearly whispered. "What if something goes wrong?"

"You can always terminate," House said.

Susan's eyes flared, "Not an option," she said.

House smiled, "I figured you say as much. Well then that being the case, you'll deal."

"Who do you want me to see?" Susan asked.

"Anderson is the least idiotic," House said which really meant that he had a lot of respect for her. "And, she specializes in high risk pregnancies. I'll refer you and in the meantime go ahead and run the blood tests you need. You know what they are."

Susan nodded and got up to leave. As she opened the door she said, "Thanks for letting me know now and not letting me figure it out on my own. It might have been several more weeks and then the medication would have…." Her voice caught and she didn't finish the sentence and walked out the door.

Back in the lab Susan went to phlebotomy and pulled three vacutainers for the different tests she would have to run. Heather was sitting at the receiving station, "Heather, would you pull my blood for me? These don't have to be fasting tests."

"Sure," she said. Heather pulled Susan's blood and gave the tubes to Susan.

Susan decided to run these tests herself as she didn't want to advertise to the entire lab what was going on. One look at the test menu and it would be all over the entire lab in an instant. Susan took the tubes with her to her old lab when she was on House's team and started up the analyzer. She set it up to run QC for the tests she needed and then put her blood on the instrument and watched the results as they came off. There it was as big as day, she was pregnant. David would be happy, he was asking her about that a year before when he had proposed. She worried about how Phillip would handle it. He was so sensitive right now and he'd finally come to terms with her role in his life only that morning. How would he deal with someone else to take some of the attention away from him? The analyzer sounded completion and she went over to the computer system to finalize the results and sent them off to House. All of her blood work looked normal, she'd do a fasting glucose test in the morning, but it was clear with even a non-fasting sample that she wasn't diabetic.

MDMDMDMD

House walked in the room and went over to Phillip to examine him again. Phillip was remarkably improved and his ammonia levels had stabilized, "I'm releasing you tomorrow," he said.

Phillip smiled, "Good, I'm ready to get out of this bed."

"Figured as much," House said reaching into his pocket. He pulled out a box and handed it to Phillip.

"What's this?" Phillip asked.

"Exactly what it says it is; you _can_ read can't you?"

Phillip gave him a look, "Yes I can read. Why are you giving me this?"

House shrugged, "I can always take it back if you don't want it," he said. "Well, have Wilson take it back anyway."

"No, don't take it back." Phillip said opening the box, "This is _awesome_." Phillip pulled out a new gaming system and smiled at House, "Thanks!"

House handed him some batteries and a used game. "I've already beat this one, but I doubt that you can."

"Wanna bet?" Phillip asked. "I bet I finish it in a week."

"OK, you're on. Finish it in a week and I'll teach to you play guitar," House said.

"And if I lose?" Phillip asked while he inserted the batteries in the game system.

House went silent while he thought about it, "Grunt work for a week," he finally said. "Need someone to clean my toilet and other nasty chores."

"You're on," Phillip said.

"Clock starts now," House walked out the door and Phillip started his game.

David watched the entire interchange in silence, his eyes going wide when House pulled out the game system. He was still staring out the door in disbelief when Susan walked in the door, "What's wrong?" she asked.

"House just walked in here, gave Phillip a new 3DS, offered to teach him to play guitar and then walked out," David said.

"If I beat this game in a week," Phillip added working himself through the first level of the game.

"Do you want to learn to play the guitar?" Susan asked.

"Yeah!" Phillip said enthusiastically.

"Is there any other instrument you'd like to learn?" Susan asked.

"Drums," Phillip said.

"So, why didn't you enroll in band at school?"

"Jerrod says band is for sissies," he answered still engrossed in his game.

"And where does Jerrod get this vast knowledge of music and musicians?" Susan asked. "Seems to me you rely on an awful lot of what Jerrod says, and not enough on your own."

Phillip paused his game and looked up at Susan, "I like Jerrod," he said.

"And that's fine; I'm just saying that you need to form your own opinions and not rely on Jerrod or anybody else to tell you what to think," Susan said. "If you want to learn to play drums, the best place to do that is at school in band. Take the class and then decide for yourself if you want to stay in it. It's your choice, not Jerrod's."

Phillip looked at Susan and then his dad, "OK," then turned back to his game.

David scooted over in the recliner and motioned for Susan to join him, "House said he's releasing Phillip tomorrow."

"Great," Susan said as she sat down.

MDMDMDMDMDMD

Foreman walked in to find House's feet sticking out from under his desk, "Ouch!"

"House, what are you doing?"

"Stabbing my finger," House said as he maneuvered out from under his desk with his finger in his mouth.

Foreman glared at him, "House."

"Fine," he said with exasperation, "don't get your panties in a wad; I'm connecting a security camera."

"Why?"

House turned on the monitor to his computer and punched a few buttons. The screen changed to an image of the supply closet in the lab, "We don't have a security camera there," Foreman said.

"We do now," House said.

"Where did you get it?"

"Nowhere special," House said.

"House!" Foreman said.

"OK! I took it from the security closet. It was in a box labeled 'broken'. I fixed it and now I'm watching the lab supply closet," House said.

"The lab isn't the only department that's missing supplies," Foreman said.

"Don't care," House said as he settled in to watch.

MDMDMDMDMD

"Are you getting hungry?" Susan asked David as Phillip was brought his tray.

"Yeah, I skipped lunch," David said.

"Me too," Susan said.

Phillip took the cover off of his food and turned up his face, "You can have mine," he said.

Susan looked at his tray. Making a face she said, "I'll be back." Susan left the room and headed down to the cafeteria where she picked up three 'to go' dinner plates and headed back to Phillip's room.

Half way through the lobby on her way to the elevator Susan nearly collided with the former director of the laboratory, "Oh, hi," she said. "Are you here visiting somebody?"

"Mind your own business," he said as he passed her and turned down the hallway.

Susan shrugged and made her way to the elevator, "Still a jerk," she said to herself as the door opened and she stepped inside.

MDMDMDMDMD

House was leaned back in his chair with his feet propped up on his desk tossing his ball on the wall above his computer monitor. Suddenly he stopped and leaned forward, "Hello," he said to the monitor. He got up and headed down to the laboratory.

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan walked in Phillip's room with the three dinner plates, "This ought to be better," she said handing one of the containers over to Phillip and then one to David.

Phillip opened his tray, "Oh yeah, much better," he said as he eyed the chocolate cake on the tray and took a bite.

Susan laughed, "Just make sure you eat the rest of your tray too."

She opened her tray and David eyed her meal, "So, we're all eating vegetarian."

"At least when we're together," Susan said. "It doesn't mean you can't go get a steak at lunch if you want, but when we eat at home as a family, we'll all eat the same thing."

"Sounds good to me," David said as he took a bite of his pasta salad.

Susan's pager went off. She pulled it off of her belt and looked at the message, "I guess I need to go to the lab."

"What's up?" David asked.

"I'm not sure, I'll be back." Susan put her tray down and walked out the door.

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan walked into her lab and found Jason at the analyzer and the rest of her evening crew busily working on their specimens, "Jason, do you know why I was paged to the lab?" Jason didn't say anything, but motioned to her office. Susan turned and went in her office where she found Abby sitting in the chair with Dr. Foreman and House standing to the side, "What's going on?" she asked.

"We found out how the supplies were missing," Foreman said gesturing over to Abby. "Turns out a card reader wouldn't have made any difference, but we're going to install them anyway."

Abby didn't say anything, but kept her eyes to the floor.

"Abby?" Susan said. "I don't understand; why would you take our supplies?" Abby remained silent.

"Black market," House said.

"There's a black market on latex gloves?" Susan asked incredulously.

"It wasn't a black market," Abby said. "It was for a clinic that couldn't get the supplies it needed."

"And so you decided to give them ours," Foreman said.

"I asked first, you said no," Abby said. "You said we couldn't afford it, but you seemed to have enough to afford to bring _him_ back," she said as she pointed to House.

"That's no excuse," Susan said. "You didn't come to me; we probably could have worked something out. I understand your wanting to help the other clinic, but you don't solve their problems by stealing from others. I'm sorry Abby, but I have to let you go."

"You can't fire me, I need this job! What about my baby? How am I going to take care of her?" Abby cried.

"Someone from security will be here shortly to watch you gather your things and escort you out of the hospital," Susan said. She picked up the phone and called security.

Security arrived and escorted Abby out of the building. Foreman left House and Susan alone and House sat down, "You handled that well," he said.

"Sucks," Susan said.

"It gets easier," he said.

"For you maybe, never for me," Susan answered.

"Are you going to press charges?" House asked.

"That's up to Foreman, but I won't encourage him to. She's young, she made a mistake and chances are she'll never make that mistake again," Susan said.

"Have you told David yet?" House asked switching gears.

"Not yet. We haven't had any time alone," Susan answered.

"You have an appointment with Anderson on Monday at 8:00," House said. Susan nodded and House got up.

"Greg?" House turned around, "I won't replace her." House nodded in understanding and went on his way.

MDMDMDMDMD

When Susan arrived back in Phillip's room, David was watching a baseball game and Phillip was still focused on his game. Susan moved one of the visitor's chairs over next to the recliner where David was sitting and sat down. David reached his hand out and Susan took it, "So what was going on at the lab?" he asked.

"Greg caught the person pilfering the supplies. It was one of my own employees, so I had to fire her," Susan said.

"You fired somebody? That is _so_ cool," Phillip said.

"No Phillip, it isn't cool. She's a single mom of a preschool age little girl and now she doesn't have a job to support her," Susan explained. "It broke my heart to let her go, but she stole from the hospital and she has to face the consequences."

"Are you OK?" David asked.

"I'm fine."

"You don't seem fine."

"I have a lot on my mind, but really I'm OK," Susan said. "It's probably time for you to get moving if you're going to make it to the grocery store before they close."

"Kicking me out?" David teased.

"Absolutely," Susan teased back.

"Alright," David said as he got up out of the chair. He went over to Phillip, "I'll be back in the morning." He ruffled his son's hair. "I love you, sleep well."

"I'll walk with you to the elevator," Susan said.

David held her hand as they walked down the hall, "Are you sure you're OK?" David asked.

"We do need to talk, but not here," Susan said. "Really, I promise I'm fine," she added when she saw the look on his face.

They stopped in front of the elevator and David turned to Susan, "Susan, we don't keep secrets from each other. If something is wrong I want to know and the sooner the better."

"Nothing is wrong David; please trust me," Susan said.

David looked long into her eyes, "OK," he said. He leaned down to kiss her, "Tomorrow then."

Susan nodded, "Tomorrow." The elevator door opened and David stepped inside. "I love you," Susan said as the door closed.

David smiled at her and after the door closed in front of him, his face sobered. He was worried about her, but she said she was fine. Something was clearly bothering her, but she asked him to trust her. She was his wife, he had to trust her. If she said she was OK, then she was OK. He pulled the list of grocery items out of his pocket and read them over. He wasn't sure what some of the items were, but he would head over to that health food store if he couldn't find what he needed at their regular grocery store.

MDMDMDMDMDMD

"Beat the game yet?" House asked when he walked in Phillip's room.

"I'm on level five," Phillip answered never taking his eyes off of the game.

House lifted his eyebrow in surprise. It'd taken him two days to get up to level five, but he wasn't about to let Phillip know. "Get's a lot harder from here, you'll never make it. Next week you'll be cleaning my toilets."

"Fat chance, next week you'll be teaching me guitar," Phillip replied.

Susan had looked up from her laptop when House walked in the door and watched the exchange. She smiled to herself when she saw Greg's reaction. She guessed she'd better start looking for a beginner's guitar. She saved and closed the document she was working on for Dr. Foreman and pulled up the internet. Fortunately as a director, she was exempt from the web filtering software the hospital had in place to keep employees from browsing the internet for un-work-related topics and she was able to search anywhere she wanted. She motioned to House and he walked over to where she was and sat in the chair next to her to see what she was doing. She did a Google search for acoustic guitars when resulted in a long list of retailers. House pointed to the third retailer on the list and she clicked the link. Once at the site she browsed to the guitars appropriate for beginners. There were several brands and she put the pointer over to Yamaha and looked over at Greg. He nodded and she clicked to open the page of Yamaha beginner guitars. She was surprised at the range of sizes for the instrument. Greg looked over at Phillip and then back down at the webpage and pointed to one of the guitars. Susan clicked on that instrument and pulled up the information. It wasn't as expensive as she thought it would be, though she supposed she'd have to upgrade to a better guitar if he stuck with it. She hoped he would as music was both a source of enjoyment for her and a method of relaxation. She could play piano, though she wasn't nearly as good as Greg and Laura, and she had played the trumpet in band. She also enjoyed singing in the choir at church and when the piece the choir was working on called for an alto ranged solo, she was often asked to do that. Music had always been a part of her life and she hoped that it would be something she and Phillip could share as their relationship grew. Susan selected the guitar and then Greg took the laptop from her. He filled out her order with the accessories they would need: strings, picks, a beginner's book, a chord chart and a tuning pitch pipe. He handed the laptop back to her as Susan pulled her credit card out of her purse, "Not electronic?" she asked as she pointed to the tuner.

"Needs to learn to hear," House replied shaking his head.

"Learn to hear what?" Phillip asked, his eyes still fully focused on the game.

"The swooshing sound of my toilet," House replied.

"No way," Phillip said. "I just hit level six."

"I think it's time to put it away for the night," Susan said as she put away her credit card. "You've been playing that thing nonstop since you got it."

"I stopped when we ate," Phillip said.

"And then you picked it right back up again. Put it away," Susan said.

Phillip rolled his eyes, "Fine," and he turned it off. He lowered his bed and pulled the covers up higher. "Dr. House?"

"What?"

"When can we take out this thing?" Phillip said pointing down.

"We can do that now," he said. "I'll call your nurse."

Phillip's eyes grew wide, "But she's a girl!"

"Most of them are around here," he answered and then got an exasperated look on his face, "Fine, I'll do it."

Susan was doing her best not to laugh, "I'll step outside for a moment."

Several moments passed and then House walked out of Phillip's room, "The dietician will be here in the morning to go over his new diet, then you can take him home."

Susan reached out and touched his hand, "Thank you Greg." House nodded and walked away.

MDMDMDMDMD

David walked in the house and took the bags to the kitchen. He put the items away and then went back out on the porch to get the mail. He started sorting through: bill, bill, junk mail, he stopped at a letter addressed to Gregory House, department of corrections with 'return to sender' stamped on it. He took it to Susan's desk in the room they used for their office and set it on her desk and put the remainder of the bills on his desk. He started to leave the room and then thought of something and went back to her desk. He opened the top drawer. In the drawer were all the letters she had written to House over the last year. They were bound together with a rubber band. David took them out and thought for a minute. He took off the rubber band and added the most recent letter to the back of the stack and put the rubber band back around it. He took the stack with him, grabbed his keys and went back out to his car.

MDMDMDMDMD

David heard the piano as he walked up the steps to the apartment complex. He went inside and knocked on House's door. The playing stopped abruptly and soon David heard the step tap sound of House walking to his door. The door opened and House looked inquisitively at David and stepped away from the door allowing David to come inside. House sat down on the sofa, and looked over at David, "Well?"

"I brought you something," David said. "I didn't know if you wanted them, but I know Susan would rest easier if you had them."

"Okay," House said not understanding what David was talking about.

"You know, she worries about you," David said.

"Yeah," House repeated.

"She doesn't eat when she worries," David said.

House nodded.

"I just want to make sure you're not going to do anything crazy," David said.

"Like?" House asked.

"Like do something stupid that throws you back in jail or puts your life in danger," David said. "I can see the difference in her since you've come home. She's relieved."

"I think you're kid coming through to her did most of that," House said.

"That's only part of it, well a big part of it, but not all," David said. "You're home and you're communicating with her and that means a lot to her. It broke her heart every time one of her letters to you was returned. She never said anything, but each time she was obviously disappointed and it would take a couple of weeks before she was back to her normal self. I finally convinced her to quit waiting on you and to go ahead and marry me without you present _and_ I asked her not to write you anymore. She obviously didn't listen to me on that because her last letter was returned to us today. It's not that I didn't want her to write you, I just didn't want to see her get hurt again."

"I've already explained to her why I didn't accept her letters," House said.

"I know and she told me and I appreciate that more than you know, but at the same time you didn't see what it did to her," David said. He put in hand in his jacket pocket and pulled out the bundle of letters and handed them over to House. "Just promise me you won't do anything crazy."

"I don't want to go back to jail and I am following the rules," House said. "But I can't promise that I'll stay out of trouble forever."

"I guess that's all I can ask," David said.

David started to leave, "No honeymoon?" House asked.

David turned back, "I plan on it, we just can't right now. Phillip is in school and when I started seeing Susan, my folks finally felt like they could start traveling since there was someone else to help watch Phillip on a moment's notice. When they come home and he has a place to stay for a few days, I'll take her someplace special." David explained.

House nodded, "Sooner's better than later."

David looked toward House waiting for more information and when none was forthcoming, he left. House set the letters down on the coffee table and returned to his piano.

A couple of hours later House got up from the piano bench and started toward his room. About half way there, he stopped, turned around and went to the table and grabbed the letters and took them with him.

MDMDMDMDMD

"Do you think it would be OK if I called Dr. House 'Uncle Greg' like Laura does or even Uncle House?" Phillip asked.

"You'd have to ask him, or better yet just try it out sometime when you're alone with him and see how he reacts," Susan said. "I think it'll probably be OK as long as you don't do it in front of people at work. He's kind of funny that way. You know, I never refer to him as Greg while we're at work unless we're alone. At work, he's always Dr. House."

"Why?" Phillip asked.

"Respect," Susan answered. "He worked for that title and he deserves to be acknowledged by it. Plus, it's just more professional."

"Do you think he really wants to teach me guitar?"

"I think he does, but you have to earn it first," Susan said. "The only thing I can't figure out is how he knew you wanted to play guitar. Not even your dad knew that."

Phillip turned a little red, "He saw me," he said sheepishly.

"What do you mean?"

"Last night after dad fell asleep, he came in while I was watching this band on the TV. There was this really cool guitar player and I was playing air guitar. I didn't see him standing there until the song was over," Phillip explained.

"Did he say anything after you realized he was there?"

"No, he just got this funny look on his face and left," Phillip said. "I was kinda embarrassed." Phillip said as he yawned.

"Must be time to go to sleep," Susan said with a smile.

"No, I can stay up longer," Phillip said obviously fighting sleep.

Susan laughed, "Lower your bed down Phillip. There's no reason to stay up any later." She got up and went over to the wall to turn off the lights, closed the blinds and then went back to the recliner. Phillip lowered the bed and turned over on his side facing Susan. Susan leaned back in the recliner and closed her eyes.

Lights dimmed in the hallway as the hospital prepared for the night. Phillip's monitoring equipment had been disconnected, so the only sounds were coming from outside the room. A few mumbles here and there as the staff walked the hallway checking on patients and a clatter down the hall when somebody dropped a chart. Susan had almost drifted off to sleep, "Mom?"

"Yes Phillip?"

"I love you."

Susan smiled to herself and a silent tear made its way down her face, "I love you too son."


	10. Chapter 10

CHAPTER TEN

Susan woke up to find Phillip making his way out of bed, "Are you ok?" she asked.

"Yeah, just need to go to the bathroom," he said. "Is it OK if I take a shower?"

"I don't see why not," Susan said. She opened his backpack and pulled out some clothes that David had packed for him when he took her home the other day and handed them to him. Phillip made his way to the bathroom and was soon in the shower.

It wasn't long before he was finished and walked out dressed in a t-shirt and his sweats. He climbed back in bed and picked up his game, "What level are you on?" Susan asked.

"Still on six, but I think I'm almost finished with it," he answered.

"Good morning," the food services lady said as she came in the room with Phillip's breakfast tray.

Phillip put away his game and lifted the lid on the tray allowing the smells from the plate to escape. The color left Susan's face, "Oh," Susan said.

Phillip looked up, "Are you OK?" he asked when he saw the look on her face.

"Umm, I need to get something in my stomach. Will you be OK for a while?" Susan asked.

"Sure," Phillip said.

Susan got up and walked out of the room rather quickly. Away from the room her nausea settled enough that she was able to get to the vending machine at the end of the hall in the stairwell and get a bag of pretzels. She sat down on the bottom step and ate a few of them slowly until her stomach settled. Once her stomach was under control, she made her way to the cafeteria to get a decent breakfast knowing that the few pretzels she ate wouldn't last long.

David walked in Phillip's room to find him finishing off French toast, "Where's Susan?" he asked.

Phillip swallowed, "She said she needed to eat something and then left kinda quick."

"Was she OK?" David asked.

"She had a funny look on her face," Phillip said.

"Funny look?"

"Like she was about to toss her cookies," a voice said behind him. David turned around and saw House standing there. "Sometimes smells trigger that response," he said pointing to Phillip's breakfast tray. "What was on your tray?"

"French toast," Phillip said. "Oh, and hot tea," he said making a face. "I don't like tea."

"I'm going down to the cafeteria to find her," David said.

"You stay here, I'll go," said House. "You have an appointment with the dietician in a few minutes and at least one of you needs to be here when she comes." House left the room and David sat down in the recliner to wait.

MDMDMDMDMD

House walked in to the cafeteria and found Susan sitting at a table eating toast and drinking hot tea, "Heard you had a sudden bout of morning sickness," he said.

"Managed to keep everything where it belonged," Susan said. "I just needed to get something in my stomach besides acid."

"Yeah, they call that morning sickness," House said.

"It won't be any worse than that; at least it wasn't last time," Susan said.

"You're not going to be able to hide this for long, especially if the nausea gets worse," House said.

"A. I'm not hiding anything. I'll tell David tonight and B. the nausea is not going to get any worse," Susan answered as House sat down across the table. "I just can't figure out how this happened."

"Umm, well it's like this, when a man and woman…," House started with the twinkle in his eye that he only ever allowed Susan to see.

"Right," she interrupted. "I think we can stop there. No, it's just that we've been very careful, especially with the changes that I'm starting to go through. I can't predict anything anymore and I have to gauge everything on how I feel. I've only allowed non-protection when I knew without a doubt that you know what was going to happen that day, and I haven't messed that up yet."

"How many of those 'you know what's' have you had since you got married?"

"Two," Susan said.

"And you've been married nearly three months. You're not _that_ irregular." House said.

"I am for me. Remember even you told me I was as regular as an atomic clock, now I vary as much as a week this way or that," Susan explained. "Enough variation that I can't just look at the calendar anymore, so we've been careful."

"David wants a kid doesn't he?" House asked.

"Yes, but we talked about it and he understands my hesitation," Susan said. "He's agreed that the risks are pretty high and both of us are in our upper 40's. Most people our age are starting to have grandchildren, not starting over with newborns. We'll be the oldest parents in the school when this one starts kindergarten."

"Bet the _protection_ has a few man-made holes in them," House said.

"David wouldn't do that. We don't keep secrets from each other," Susan said.

"Everybody lies."

"Not David," Susan said. "Not about this. He might not tell me everything to try to protect me, but he wouldn't go behind my back and do something like this. He loves me too much." Susan took another bite of her toast.

"He _is_ protective, but he's also possessive," House said.

"How do you mean?" Susan asked.

"He's always holding or touching you, like he's expecting you to run off," House said.

Susan smiled, "He's not being possessive. He's overcompensating."

House looked at her inquisitively and Susan explained, "I've shared with him everything from my marriage to Jeff. He knows that Jeff was 'hands off' except when he had to touch me for some reason or another and he knows that I craved that attention. He's trying to make up for that so I won't feel the same way with him, so every time we're in the same vicinity, he's holding my hand, or has his arm around me. He even sleeps like that, though he knows not to crowd me too much because I get too hot at night otherwise."

"I'd still check the prophylactics," House said. He stood up, "I wouldn't take too much longer down here; your possessive lover boy will start hunting you down if you don't show up soon."

"I didn't realize he was here already," Susan said. She took her last bite of toast and got up.

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan arrived back in Phillip's room moments after the dietician. David looked over at her as she came in, obviously relieved to see her, "I heard you were feeling a little sick earlier."

"I'm fine, I just needed to get something in my stomach," Susan said blowing it off as nothing.

The dietician introduced herself to Susan and then the four of them sat down in varying places around Phillip's bed and went over the dietary restrictions necessary for a person with OTC Syndrome. She explained that because Phillip was still growing that he did need some protein but that they should limit his intake to 12 grams per day and that he should be checked regularly for his ammonia levels. She also told him that his doctor would prescribe medication to help keep the ammonia levels down, but that despite everything they would do to keep levels in the normal range; it was possible when he was middle aged that he would need a liver transplant. Hearing that was a surprise to David and Phillip, although Susan already knew that this was a possibility. "You knew this already," David said to Susan.

Susan nodded.

"Why didn't you tell me?" David asked.

"I was planning on it later; I just didn't want to talk about it in front of Phillip. I didn't want to worry him and who knows what treatments they'll come up with in the next few years. We're going to follow the diet closely and do everything we can to protect his liver and we're going to stay current on the research surrounding the disease," Susan said.

Phillip looked at Susan, "You gave your liver to Dr. House. He's doing OK."

"Yes, you can live a long time with a liver transplant, but let's not cross that bridge unless we have to," Susan said. "We'll do everything we can to keep yours healthy."

The dietician took her leave having left behind a stack of literature for them to read along with a number of recipes for them to try. David started packing up the literature and Phillip's things when the nurse came in to start the procedures to release Phillip from the hospital. She handed Susan the prescriptions that Dr. House had written out for Phillip along with a note with David's name on the front which she handed to David without opening it.

David opened the note and read it, glanced up at Susan, and then put in his pocket, "What did it say dad?" Phillip asked.

"It was personal," David said.

Phillip got out of bed and sat down in the wheel chair he was required to sit in until he left the hospital building, "I'm glad to go home."

"So are we," David answered. The three of them walked out of the hospital together, but since they were in two different vehicles, Phillip rode home with his dad. Susan decided to run by the drug store on her way home.

Susan returned to the house about a half hour after David and Phillip. She walked in the door and headed to the bedroom with her purchases and then went into the kitchen where David was trying to figure out what to fix for lunch that was within Phillip's new dietary restrictions. "Hey," she said walking up to him.

"Hey," he said smiling down at her. "What took you so long?"

"I deviated to the drug store to pick up a few things," Susan said.

"Deviated? Funny way of putting it. So, are you ready to talk to me yet?" David asked. "I know there's more than just the potential liver damage on your mind."

"Where's Phillip?"

"I'm right here," Phillip said as he walked in the kitchen. What are we eating? I'm hungry."

Susan opened the refrigerator, pulled out an apple and tossed it over to Phillip, "Eat that to hold you over and we'll work on one of the recipes we picked out." Susan pulled out the cookbook, opened it and the three of them together prepared their first vegetarian dish.

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan sat on the edge of the bed pulling off her shoes while David was in the bathroom. He emerged a few moments later significantly less dressed than he had been when he went in. Susan got up and came close, just as she came near and he put his arms out, she passed by in a teasing manner, "My turn," went into the bathroom and closed the door.

David growled, "Tease!" He heard Susan laugh through the door.

MDMDMDMD

Phillip had just turned off his light and crawled in his bed. He heard his dad make some noise at Susan and her laugh. He couldn't hear the details of their conversations, just mumblings and of course sometimes, if he was lying awake at night he heard other sounds, but usually he couldn't hear them at all. Of course, when he did hear them he knew what they were doing, he was twelve after all and he knew all about sex. He remembered last month when Jerrod was spending the night, they heard those noises. Jerrod had been telling him about his step mother and how much she was always getting into his business making Phillip wonder how long it would be before Susan did the same thing. Suddenly Jerrod got a look on his face as he listened to the sounds through the vents, "I know how you could keep her out of your business," he said.

"How's that?" Phillip had asked.

"I'll show you tomorrow," he said and then the boys turned up the volume on the video screen and concentrated on their game.

The next morning, they snuck into David and Susan's bedroom and Jerrod went into their bathroom. He started looking through the cabinets. "What are you looking for?"

"Your stepmom's medicine."

"Why?"

"I want to see if she's on the pill," Jerrod said.

Phillip looked confused, "What pill?"

"Don't you know anything? The one that keeps her from getting pregnant," Jerrod explained.

"Oh, I see her take two pills every morning, but she said they are to keep her blood pressure normal."

"Are they in a packet or something that looks like a wallet?" Jerrod asked. "My real mom's are in a round packet."

"These are just in regular pill bottles," Phillip said.

"Then that's not them. I bet they use condoms," Jerrod said and he went to the bed and opened the drawer "Bingo. I need a needle."

"Why?"

Jerrod looked at Phillip, "Do I have to explain everything to you? If we poke holes in these, then she'll get pregnant. Then she'll be so busy with the baby that she won't have time to bother with you."

"Oh. I don't think we should do that," Phillip said.

"It's the only way Phillip and I promise it will work."

"I don't know," Phillip said.

"You're just chicken," Jerrod said as he started rummaging through the drawer. He found a small sewing kit for repairing buttons and things, "Perfect." He pushed a needle through the first condom.

"Jerrod stop, I really don't think we should do this," Phillip said. "Let's go back upstairs and play another video game."

"Fine then," he said dropping the condom back in the drawer, "I was just trying to help you out."

They had gone back upstairs and by the time Jerrod had to leave, Phillip had forgotten about the condom until just before bed. He couldn't go down and get it then because his parents were already asleep in their in their room. He decided he's go in there in the morning and throw it away. The next morning he'd gone in their room, but the condom with the needle hole in it was gone.

Phillip knew what he needed to do, but he also knew that he would get in a lot of trouble. He tossed and turned for a while and then finally got up and headed down stairs.

MDMDMDMDMD

Susan came out of the bathroom in her nightshirt and walked over to her side of the bed. She pulled a bottle of lotion out of her drawer and started rubbing some on her legs, "My skin is so dry right now. It's driving me nuts."

David sat up in bed and took the lotion from her, "Lay back." David put some lotion in his hands are started massaging it into the skin on her legs.

Susan melted into the bed, "You are too good to me," she said savoring the moment. After a couple of minutes of the most wonderful massage she had ever had, she said, "I've been thinking."

"No kidding," David said teasing her. Susan went silent. After a moment David stopped and looked at her, "Well?"

"Well what?" Susan asked with a twinkle in her eye.

"What have you been thinking?" David asked.

"Oh, you want to know," Susan said. "Nothing." David stopped massaging, "Hey don't stop!" Susan said.

"Oh, you want me to continue," David said with a laugh in his voice.

Susan smiled at him. "Phillip doesn't want me to be his stepmom. Instead of just giving me guardianship of him, would you be OK if I adopted him? That way, I'd be his real mom and this whole stepmom issue he has been dealing with goes away."

David continued his massage, "I think I would like that, but we should leave it up to Phillip. We'll talk to him about it tomorrow." David finished massaging the lotion into Susan's legs and started working his way over the rest of her body nudging her out of her night clothes as he was doing so, "I don't know why you insist on wearing something to bed, you know I'm just going to take it back off," he said as he nuzzled down closer to her.

"Two reasons, I can't sleep that way because I feel too exposed," Susan said lifting her arms as he removed the night shirt.

He pulled her closer to him, "You said two reasons," as he started kissing her neck and ear.

Susan's breath started getting heavier, "I like the way it feels when you take it off."

"Oh, that's just naughty," he said with a growl. He pulled Susan under him and reached to the nightstand for the package she always had prepared for him. It wasn't there, so without missing a beat he deftly opened the drawer and pulled one out.

Susan reached for his hand and took the package away, "You don't need this tonight," she said softly and dropped it to the floor. David grunted his acknowledgement and found his way home.

David and Susan lay staring at the ceiling, their breathing slowly coming back to normal pace, "So I guess I've got about a week or so of limited access," David said.

"No," Susan said. "No limited access."

David turned his head toward her, "But the only time you've let me go without is when you're getting ready to start."

"I know," Susan said.

David was quiet for a moment, "Have you changed your mind about trying?"

"No," Susan said.

"Then what was the occasion, not that I'm complaining, but…"

"Once the dam has been breached, you may as well open the flood gates," Susan interrupted.

"The dam has been breached?" David said working out the metaphor in his mind.

Susan turned toward him, "One of your little swimmers managed to escape, though I haven't figured out how. We're always so careful."

He turned toward her, "You're pregnant?" Susan nodded. David smiled at her then sobered when he saw the look in her eyes. "What's wrong?"

"I'm scared," she answered. "I'm too old, David. So many things can go wrong."

"And we're not going to worry about them. We'll get you the best care and Phillip and I will be with you every step of the way."

"Phillip is the other thing I'm worried about, he's only just now accepted me. What's going to happen when the baby comes along and I have to place so much of my attention on the baby and less on him? How's he going to react?"

"We've got nine months to get him used to the idea; it'll be fine," David assured her. "Well, I guess nine months, how far along are you?"

"It's been almost six weeks since my last cycle, but Greg thinks I'm about four weeks. He's set up an appointment for me with Dr. Anderson. He says she's the least idiotic, which means that he has a lot of respect for her."

"This explains a lot actually," David said. "All the references about you needing to take care of yourself and that sudden bout of nausea….," he trailed off thinking, "Susan?" Susan looked into David's eyes, "Why did you tell House before you told me? I know he's your brother, but I'm your husband. You should be comfortable to tell me anything."

Susan smiled and rubbed her hand across David's face, "I am comfortable to tell you anything," Susan said. "I didn't tell Greg. He told me. Believe me, if I'd known, you would have been the first person I told."

"How did he know?" David asked.

"He just did. He's that good at what he does," Susan said. "In fact, he's already saved our child from a long life of kidney problems." David looked at her in question. "I was talking to him in his office when he asked out of the blue what medication I was on for my blood pressure and when I told him he wrote out a new prescription. Linsinopril causes kidney deformations in the second and third trimester. If he hadn't gotten out of prison early…" Susan's voice caught, "I just thought I was going through menopause."

David brought Susan closer to him and held her tight, "And that's why everything is going to be fine. You have the best doctor in the world for a brother and he's going to be watching you like a hawk. The only person more protective of you than him is me. Everything is going to be fine. Our baby is going to be fine."

They cuddled for a while and then Susan got up and made her way to the bathroom, stopping to pick up her nightshirt and fresh underwear on the way. She shut the door and left David to his thoughts. His son had finally accepted Susan as his mother and although he had a genetic condition, he was going to be okay. His wife was pregnant with his child and though he wasn't upset about it at all, he couldn't help but wonder what happened. He didn't remember any tears or slippages…..there was a knock on the door, "Dad? Can I come in?"

"What's wrong Phillip, are you OK?"

Phillip opened the door, "I need to talk to you."

Susan heard Phillip come in the bedroom and heard them talking. She finished dressing, turned out the light and opened the door quietly so she could hear.

"….and then he poked a hole in it and when I came back to get it and throw it away it was gone."

"Son, I'm at a loss for words here. I can't believe you would do something like that," David paused for a moment and the more he thought about it, the angrier he got. "Son, you've allowed Jerrod to influence you far too much. This is serious son, your actions…..no, don't start blaming him for your actions," he said pointing at Phillip when he saw him start to defend himself. "You knew what he was doing and you could have stopped him before the damage had been done or at the very least taken the damaged one from him and threw it away then. _Your_ actions," he said pointing at him again, "have consequences, serious ones. Because of what you've done, Susan is pregnant. This isn't going to be easy for her at her age and the baby is at a higher risk for Downs Syndrome among other things and while we will all love the baby and be blessed by it, this pregnancy should have been _her_ decision to make and _you_ took that away from her," he continued, his voice getting louder and more firm the longer he went. "You've hurt her over and over because you apparently lack the ability to see things yourself. This is it Phillip, I've had it. I think I've been pretty patient up to now, but not anymore. I don't want you hanging around Jerrod anymore."

Phillip started to argue back, but David interrupted him, "No, I don't want to hear it. No more; period."

"Phillip, go to your room. We'll talk about this tomorrow," Susan said from the bathroom doorway.

Phillip turned his head to look toward Susan, "Yes ma'am," he said quietly. He left and went to his room.

Susan came to bed and climbed in, "You need to calm down."

"I can't believe this," David said. "Why would he do something like this?" He looked over at Susan, "Why aren't you angry?"

"Not much point, what's done is done. As you said, we're going to love the baby and be blessed by it. Besides, this happened weeks ago. He only just opened up to me yesterday. This confession is his way of coming to terms with his actions over the last couple of months," Susan said. "He wants to be forgiven."

"So, you're saying that we should just let it go," David said.

"Not at all, there needs to be consequences for his actions and behavior, but he needs to know we still love him despite everything."

"What kinds of consequences?" David asked.

"I'm thinking diaper patrol," Susan said with a smile. "Seriously though, let him stew over what you said tonight and then tomorrow we'll talk and make that decision. However, I don't think your limiting his exposure to Jerrod is going to work; they go to the same school and have several classes together. I think he feels bad for everything and my guess is that he'll limit his time with Jerrod on his own."

Susan yawned, "I'm tired." She kissed David on the cheek and laid down facing away from David, letting him to his thoughts.

After several moments he said, "Susan?"

"Mmmhmm."

"I'm taking you on a honeymoon weekend after next."

"What about Phillip?" Susan asked opening her eyes.

"You know that note that was with the prescriptions? It was from House," David said.

"Ok," Susan answered not quite understanding.

"It said, 'Bring the kid over in two weekends; you can have three days.'"

Susan smiled, he did it again. He never failed to come through for her even when in prison or under house arrest, "Sounds good," she said and went to sleep.

MDMDMDMDMD

House lay in bed staring at the ceiling. He couldn't sleep. By now he figured, Susan had told David about the baby and he probably told her about his note. What was he going to do with a pre-teen boy for three days? Well, there was the guitar; they could start with his lessons. At the rate Phillip was going, he'd have that game whipped in two more days. They could play video games; he wondered if the kid knew how to play chess. He'd ask Wilson what to do, he'd know. He turned on his side and saw the stack of letters on the nightstand. He reached over and picked them up.

He sat up in bed and took off the rubber band from around the letters. He took the top letter off the stack which was the oldest and opened it. When he pulled out the letter and unfolded it, a string bracelet fell out. He picked it up and looked at the pattern Susan had designed when she braided it. He slipped it on his wrist and began to read, Dear Greg…

MDMDMDMDMD

David turned on his side toward Susan and spooned up behind her leaving a little bit a space between their bodies so she wouldn't get too hot. He gently rubbed her back, carefully so he wouldn't wake her. He thought about everything that had happened in their lives over the last three months. So many changes and adjustments for everybody in such a short period of time: House had been in prison and then suddenly was not, but he still wasn't free so he was adjusting to life bound by restrictions, something he certainly wasn't used to. He and Susan had gotten married and they were adjusting to life with each other. Phillip had to adjust to having Susan in his life full time and on top of that now had to deal with his illness and the restrictions on his diet. Laura was due to be home in a few weeks for Thanksgiving break; they'd tell her their news, and she'd be happy for them and then would go back to school. It wouldn't affect her a great deal until she came home over the summer. It'd be good to have her home then because that would be perfect timing to help with the newborn. And then there was him; he was married and about to be a father for the second, no third time in his life if he counted Laura too – and he did. He was older and Susan was right, it would be a lot harder this time around than it was when they were young. His hand found its way to the bottom of her shirt and he slipped his hand underneath and up the front. He had to reach up to her chest and hold her there for a minute – he was a guy, he just had to, but soon he moved his hand down to her abdomen to cover his baby. Yes, lots of changes to adjust to in his life and while this one was a big one, it was one he was more than happy to accommodate. He kissed the back of her neck and fell asleep.


	11. Chapter 11

EPILOGUE

Phillip looked around the cafeteria for a place to sit. He saw a table at the back of the room and headed toward it. He sat down and opened his lunch pack. Susan had prepared a pasta salad and fresh vegetables with ranch dip for him. He pulled out his lunch and started eating, "What is that crap?" Jerrod asked as he sat down next to him.

"It's my lunch," Phillip said. "I'm a vegetarian now."

"Your stepmom make that for you?" Jerrod asked.

"Yeah, so?" Phillip asked.

"You'll end up sick and in the hospital again if you eat it," he said.

"No I won't," Phillip said. "She didn't make me sick before either."

Phillip pulled a sandwich bag of home made cookies out of his lunch pack. Jerrod reached out and took them, "Your stepmom won't let you have these before you finish the rest."

Phillip stood up and snatched the bag back from Jerrod, "She's my _mom_ and she doesn't care." Phillip put everything back in his pack and started to leave.

"Hey, you want to go play catch during study hall?" Jerrod called out as Phillip was leaving.

"Nope, I'll be in band," Phillip answered and walked away.


End file.
